ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP 


BEING   FACTS  AND  FANCIES  OF 
MEDICAL   LIFE 


BY 

A.   CONAN   DOYLE 

AUTHOR    OF 
THE    WHITE    COMPANY,    THE    REFUGEES,    MICAH    CLARKE,    ETC. 


NEW   YORK    AND    LONDON 

D.  APPLETON   AND   COMPANY 

1910 


Copyright,  1894, 

By  d.  appleton  and  company. 


THE    PEEFACE. 

[Being  an  extract  from  a  long  and  animated  correspond- 
ence icith  a  friend  in  America.'] 

I  QUITE  recognise  the  force  of  your  objection 
that  an  invalid  or  a  woman  in  weak  health  would 
get  no  good  from  stories  which  attempt  to  treat 
some  features  of  medical  life  with  a  certain  amount 
of  realism.  If  you  deal  with  this  life  at  all,  how- 
ever, and  if  you  are  anxious  to  make  your  doc- 
tors something  more  than  marionettes,  it  is  quite 
essential  that  you  should  paint  the  darker  side, 
since  it  is  that  which  is  principally  presented  to 
the  surgeon  or  physician.  He  sees  many  beau- 
tiful things,  it  is  true,  fortitude  and  heroism,  love 
and  self-sacrifice  ;  but  they  are  all  called  forth  (as 
our  nobler  qualities  are  always  called  forth)  by 
bitter  sorrow  and  trial.  One  cannot  write  of 
medical  life  and  be  merry  over  it. 

Then  why  write  of  it,  you  may  ask  ?  If  a  sub- 
ject is  painful  why  treat  it  at  all  ?  I  answer  that 
it  is  the  province  of  fiction  to  treat  painful  things 


iv  THE  PREFACE. 

as  well  as  cheerful  ones.  The  story  which  wiles 
away  a  weary  hour  fulfils  an  obviously  good  pur- 
pose, but  not  more  so,  I  hold,  than  that  which 
helps  to  emphasise  the  graver  side  of  life.  A  tale 
which  may  startle  the  reader  out  of  his  usual 
grooves  of  thought,  and  shocks  him  into  serious- 
ness, plays  the  part  of  the  alterative  and  tonic  in 
medicine,  bitter  to  the  taste  but  bracing  in  the 
result.  There  are  a  few  stories  in  this  little  col- 
lection which  might  have  such  an  effect,  and  I 
have  so  far  shared  in  your  feeling  that  I  have 
reserved  them  from  serial  publication.  In  book- 
form  the  reader  can  see  that  they  are  medical 
stories,  and  can,  if  he  or  she  be  so  minded,  avoid 

them. 

Yours  very  truly, 

A.  CoNAN  Doyle. 


P.  S. — You  ask  about  the  Red  Lamp.  It  is 
the  usual  sign  of  the  general  practitioner  in  Eng- 
land. 


CONTENTS. 


PAGE 

Behind  the  Times 1 

His  First  Operation 9 

A  Straggler  of  '15 19 

The  Third  Generation 43 

A  False  Start 60 

The  Curse  of  Eve 82 

Sweethearts 101 

A  Physiologist's  Wife Ill 

The  Case  of  Lady  Sannox 144 

A  Question  of  Diplomacy 161 

A  Medical  Document 186 

Lot  No.  249 205 

The  Los  Amigos  Fiasco 263 

The  Doctors  of  Hoyland 276 

The  Surgeon  talks 296 


ROUND   THE   RED   LAMP. 


BEHIND   THE  TIMES. 

My  first  interview  with  Dr.  James  Winter 
was  under  dramatic  circumstances.  It  occurred 
at  two  in  the  morning  in  the  bedroom  of  an  old 
country  house.  I  Idclved  him  twice  on  the  white 
waistcoat  and  knocked  off  his  gokl  spectacles, 
while  he  with  the  aid  of  a  female  accomplice 
stifled  my  angry  cries  in  a  flannel  petticoat  and 
thrust  me  into  a  warm  bath.  I  am  told  that  one 
of  my  parents,  who  happened  to  be  present,  re- 
marked in  a  whisper  that  there  was  nothing  the 
matter  with  my  lungs.  I  cannot  recall  how 
Dr.  Winter  looked  at  the  time,  for  I  had  other 
things  to  think  of,  but  his  description  of  my  own 
appearance  is  far  from  flattering.  A  fluffy  head, 
a  body  like  a  trussed  goose,  very  bandy  legs,  and 
feet  with  the  soles  turned  inwards — those  are  the 
main  items  which  he  can  remember. 

From  this  time  onwards  the  epochs  of  my  life 
were  the  periodical  assaults  which  Dr.  Winter 


2,.  :  :,  .  ■,  :  •..;  •fiOUm'.TjFIi:  RED  LAMP. 

made  upon  me.  He  vaccinated  me  ;  lie  cut  me  for 
an  abscess ;  lie  blistered  me  for  mumps.  It  was  a 
world  of  peace  and  lie  the  one  dark  cloud  that 
threatened.  But  at  last  there  came  a  time  of  real 
illness— a  time  when  I  lay  for  months  together 
inside  my  wickerwork-basket  bed,  and  then  it  was 
that  I  learned  that  that  hard  face  could  relax, 
that  those  county-made  creaking  boots  could 
steal  very  gently  to  a  bedside,  and  that  that 
rough  voice  could  thin  into  a  whisper  when  it 
spoke  to  a  sick  child. 

And  now  the  child  is  himself  a  medical  man, 
and  yet  Dr.  Winter  is  the  same  as  ever.  I  can 
see  no  change  since  first  I  can  remember  him,  save 
that  perhaps  the  brindled  hair  is  a  trifle  whiter, 
and  the  huge  shoulders  a  little  more  bowed.  He 
is  a  very  tall  man,  though  he  loses  a  couple  of 
inches  from  his  stoop.  That  big  back  of  his  has 
curved  itself  over  sick  beds  until  it  has  set  in  that 
shape.  His  face  is  of  a  walnut  brown,  and  tells  of 
long  winter  drives  over  bleak  country  roads,  with 
the  wind  and  the  rain  in  his  teeth.  It  looks 
smooth  at  a  little  distance,  but  as  you  approach 
him  you  see  that  it  is  shot  with  innumerable  fine 
wrinkles  like  a  last  year's  apple.  They  are  hardly 
to  be  seen  when  he  is  in  repose ;  but  when  he 
laughs  his  face  breaks  like  a  starred  glass,  and 
you  realise  then  that  though  he  looks  old,  he 
must  be  older  than  he  looks. 


BEHIND  TPIE  TIMES.  3 

How  old  that  is  I  could  never  discover.  I  have 
often  tried  to  find  out,  and  have  struck  his  stream 
as  high  up  as  George  IV  and  even  the  Regency, 
but  without  ever  getting  quite  to  the  source.  His 
mind  must  have  been  open  to  impressions  very 
early,  but  it  must  also  have  closed  early,  for  the 
politics  of  the  day  have  little  interest  for  him,  while 
he  is  fiercely  excited  about  questions  which  are 
entirely  prehistoric.  He  shakes  his  head  when  he 
speaks  of  the  first  Eeform  Bill  and  expresses 
grave  doubts  as  to  its  wisdom,  and  I  have  heard 
him,  when  he  was  warmed  by  a  glass  of  wine,  say 
bitter  things  about  Robert  Peel  and  his  abandon- 
ing of  the  Corn  Laws.  The  death  of  that  states- 
man brought  the  history  of  England  to  a  definite 
close,  and  Dr.  Winter  refers  to  everything  which 
had  happened  since  then  as  to  an  insignificant 
anticlimax. 

But  it  was  only  when  I  had  myself  become  a 
medical  man  that  I  was  able  to  appreciate  how 
entirely  he  is  a  survival  of  a  past  generation.  He 
had  learned  his  medicine  under  that  obsolete  and 
forgotten  system  by  which  a  youth  was  appren- 
ticed to  a  surgeon,  in  the  days  when  the  study  of 
anatomy  was  often  approached  through  a  violated 
grave.  His  views  upon  his  own  profession  are 
even  more  reactionary  than  in  politics.  Fifty 
years  have  brought  him  little  and  deprived  him 
of  less.     Vaccination  was  well  within  the  teach- 


4  ROUND   THE  RED   LAMP. 

ing  of  his  youth,  though  I  think  he  has  a  secret 
preference  for  inoculation.  Bleeding  he  would 
practise  freely  but  for  public  opinion.  Chloro- 
form he  regards  as  a  dangerous  innovation,  and 
he  always  clicks  with  his  tongue  when  it  is  men- 
tioned. He  has  even  been  known  to  say  vain 
things  about  Laennec,  and  to  refer  to  the  stetho- 
scope as  "a  new-fangled  French  toy."  He  carries 
one  in  his  hat  out  of  deference  to  the  expectations 
of  his  patients,  but  he  is  very  hard  of  hearing,  so 
that  it  makes  little  difference  whether  he  uses  it 
or  not. 

He  reads,  as  a  duty,  his  weekly  medical  paper, 
so  that  he  has  a  general  idea  as  to  the  advance  of 
modern  science.  He  always  persists  in  looking 
upon  it  as  a  huge  and  rather  ludicrous  experi- 
ment. The  germ  theory  of  disease  set  him 
chuckling  for  a  long  time,  and  his  favourite  Joke 
in  the  sick  room  was  to  say,  "Shut  the  door 
or  the  germs  will  be  getting  in."  As  to  the 
Darwinian  theory,  it  struck  him  as  being  the 
crowning  joke  of  the  century.  "The  children 
in  the  nursery  and  the  ancestors  in  the  stable," 
he  would  cry,  and  laugh  the  tears  out  of  his 
eyes. 

He  is  so  very  much  behind  the  day  that  occa- 
sionally, as  things  move  round  in  their  usual  circle, 
he  finds  himself,  to  his  bewilderment,  in  the  front  of 
the  fashion.     Dietetic  treatment,  for  example,  had 


BEHIND   THE  TIMES.  5 

been  much  in  vogue  in  his  youth,  and  he  has  more 
practical  knowledge  of  it  than  any  one  whom  I 
have  met.  Massage,  too,  was  familiar  to  him  when 
it  was  new  to  our  generation.  He  had  been 
trained  also  at  a  time  when  instruments  were  in 
a  rudimentary  state,  and  when  men  learned  to 
trust  more  to  their  own  fingers.  He  has  a  model 
surgical  hand,  muscular  in  the  palm,  tapering  in 
the  fingers,  "with  an  eye  at  the  end  of  each."  I 
shall  not  easily  forget  how  Dr.  Patterson  and  I 
cut  Sir  John  Sirwell,  the  County  Member,  and 
were  unable  to  find  the  stone.  It  was  a  horrible 
moment.  Both  our  careers  were  at  stake.  And 
then  it  was  that  Dr.  Winter,  whom  we  had  asked 
out  of  courtesy  to  be  present,  introduced  into  the 
wound  a  finger  which  seemed  to  our  excited 
senses  to  be  about  nine  inches  long,  and  hooked 
out  the  stone  at  the  end  of  it.  "It's  always  well 
to  bring  one  in  your  waistcoat-pocket,"  said  he 
with  a  chuckle,  "but  I  suppose  you  youngsters 
are  above  all  that." 

We  made  him  president  of  our  branch  of  the 
British  Medical  Association,  but  he  resigned  after 
the  first  meeting.  "  The  young  men  are  too  much 
for  me,"  he  said.  "  I  don't  understand  what  they 
are  talking  about."  Yet  his  patients  do  very  well. 
He  has  the  healing  touch — that  magnetic  thing 
which  defies  explanation  or  analj^sis,  but  which  is 
a  very  evident  fact  none  the  less.     His  mere  pres 


6  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

ence  leaves  the  patient  with  more  hopefulness  and 
vitality.  The  sight  of  disease  affects  him  as  dust 
does  a  careful  housewife.  It  makes  him  angry 
and  impatient.  "Tut,  tut,  this  will  never  do!" 
he  cries,  as  he  takes  over  a  new  case.  He  would 
shoo  Death  out  of  the  room  as  though  he  were  an 
intrusive  hen.  But  when  the  intruder  refuses  to 
be  dislodged,  when  the  blood  moves  more  slowly 
and  the  eyes  grow  dimmer,  then  it  is  that  Dr. 
Winter  is  of  more  avail  than  all  the  drugs  in  his 
surgery.  Dying  folk  cling  to  his  hand  as  if  the 
presence  of  his  bulk  and  vigour  gives  them  more 
courage  to  face  the  change  ;  and  that  kindly,  wind- 
beaten  face  has  been  the  last  earthly  impression 
which  many  a  sufferer  has  carried  into  the  un- 
known. 

When  Dr.  Patterson  and  I — both  of  us  young, 
energetic,  and  up-to-date— settled  in  the  district, 
we  were  most  cordially  received  by  the  old  doc- 
tor, who  would  have  been  only  too  happy  to  be 
relieved  of  some  of  his  patients.  The  patients 
themselves,  however,  followed  their  own  inclina- 
tions— which  is  a  reprehensible  way  that  patients 
have— so  that  we  remained  neglected,  with  our 
modern  instruments  and  our  latest  alkaloids,  while 
he  was  serving  out  senna  and  calomel  to  all  the 
countryside.  We  both  of  us  loved  the  old  fel- 
low, but  at  the  same  time,  in  the  privacy  of  our 
own  intimate  conversations,  we  could  not  help 


BEHIND  THE  TIMES.  7 

commenting  upon  tliis  deplorable  lack  of  judg- 
ment. "It's  all  very  well  for  the  poorer  people," 
said  Patterson.  "But  after  all  the  educated 
classes  have  a  right  to  expect  that  their  medical 
man  will  know  the  difference  between  a  mitral 
murmur  and  a  bronchitic  rale.  It's  the  judicial 
frame  of  mind,  not  the  sympathetic,  which  is  the 
essential  one." 

I  thoroughly  agreed  with  Patterson  in  what  he 
said.  It  happened,  however,  that  very  shortly 
afterwards  the  epidemic  of  influenza  broke  out, 
and  w^e  were  all  worked  to  death.  One  morning 
I  met  Patterson  on  my  round,  and  found  him 
looking  rather  pale  and  fagged  out.  He  made 
the  same  remark  about  me.  I  was,  in  fact,  feel- 
ing far  from  well,  and  I  lay  upon  the  sofa  all 
the  afternoon  ^vith  a  splitting  headache  and  pains 
in  every  joint.  As  evening  closed  in,  I  could 
no  longer  disguise  the  fact  that  the  scourge  was 
upon  me,  and  I  felt  that  I  should  have  medical 
advice  without  delay.  It  was  of  Patterson,  natu- 
rally, that  I  thought,  but  somehow  the  idea  of 
him  had  suddenly  become  repugnant  to  me.  I 
thought  of  his  cold,  critical  attitude,  of  his  end- 
less questions,  of  his  tests  and  his  tappings.  I 
wanted  something  more  soothing-r-something  more 
genial. 

"Mrs.  Hudson,"  said  I  to  my  housekeeper, 
"would  you  kindly  run  along  to  old  Dr.  Winter 


8  ROUND  THE   RED  LAMP. 

and  tell  him  that  I  should  be  obliged  to  him  if  he 
would  step  round  ? " 

She  was  back  with  an  answer  presently.  "Dr. 
Winter  will  come  round  in  an  hour  or  so,  sir ;  but 
he  has  just  been  called  in  to  attend  Dr.  Patter- 


HIS  FIRST  OPERATIOISr. 

It  was  the  first  day  of  the  winter  session,  and 
the  third  year's  man  was  walking  with  the  first 
year's  man.  Twelve  o'clock  was  just  booming  out 
from  the  Tron  Church. 

"  Let  me  see,"  said  the  third  year's  man.  "You 
have  never  seen  an  operation  ? " 

"Never." 

"  Then  this  way,  please.  This  is  Rutherford's 
historic  bar.  A  glass  of  sherry,  please,  for  this 
gentleman.  You  are  rather  sensitive,  are  you 
not?" 

"  My  nerves  are  not  very  strong,  I  am  afraid." 

"  Hum  !  Another  glass  of  sherry  for  this  gen- 
tleman. "We  are  going  to  an  operation  now,  you 
know." 

The  novice  squared  his  shoulders  and  made  a 
gallant  attempt  to  look  unconcerned. 

"  Nothing  very  bad— eh  ? " 

"Well,  yes — pretty  bad." 

"  An — an  amputation  ? " 

"  No ;  it's  a  bigger  affair  than  that." 

2  (9) 


10  ROUND  THE  RED   DAMP. 

"I  think— I  think  they  must  be  expecting  me 
at  home." 

"There's  no  sense  in  funking.  If  you  don't  go 
to-day,  you  must  to-morrow.  Better  get  it  over 
at  once.     Feel  pretty  fit  ? " 

"  Oh,  yes  ;  all  right !  "  The  smile  was  not  a 
success. 

"One  more  glass  of  sherry,  then.  Now  come 
on  or  we  shall  be  late.  I  want  you  to  be  well  in 
front." 

"  Surely  that  is  not  necessary." 

"Oh,  it  is  far  better!  What  a  drove  of  stu- 
dents !  There  are  plenty  of  new  men  among  them. 
You  can  tell  them  easily  enough,  can't  you?  If 
they  were  going  down  to  be  operated  upon  them- 
selves, they  could  not  look  whiter." 

"  I  don't  think  I  should  look  as  white." 

"Well,  I  was  just  the  same  myself.  But  the 
feeling  soon  wears  off.  You  see  a  fellow  with  a 
face  like  plaster,  and  before  the  week  is  out  he  is 
eating  his  lunch  in  the  dissecting  rooms.  I'll  tell 
you  al)  about  the  case  when  we  get  to  the  thea- 
tre." 

The  students  were  pouring  down  the  sloping 
street  which  led  to  the  infirmary — each  with  his 
little  sheaf  of  note-books  in  his  hand.  There  were 
pale,  frightened  lads,  fresh  from  the  high  schools, 
and  callous  old  chronics,  whose  generation  had 
passed  on  and  left  them.     They  swept  in  an  un- 


HIS   FIRST   OPERATION.  H 

broken,  tumultuous  stream  from  tlie  university 
gate  to  the  hospital.  The  figures  and  gait  of  the 
men  were  young,  but  there  was  little  youth  in 
most  of  their  faces.  Some  looked  as  if  they  ate 
too  little— a  few  as  if  they  drank  too  much.  Tall 
and  short,  tweed-coated  and  black,  round-shoul- 
dered, bespectacled,  and  slim,  they  crowded  with 
clatter  of  feet  and  rattle  of  sticks  through  the  hos- 
pital gate.  Now  and  again  they  thickened  into 
two  lines,  as  the  carriage  of  a  surgeon  of  the  staff 
rolled  over  the  cobblestones  between. 

"There's  going  to  be  a  crowd  at  Archer's," 
whispered  the  senior  man  with  suppressed  excite- 
ment. "  It  is  grand  to  see  him  at  work.  I've  seen 
him  jab  all  round  the  aorta  until  it  made  me 
jumpy  to  watch  him.  This  way,  and  mind  the 
whitewash." 

They  passed  under  an  archway  and  down  a 
long,  stone-flagged  corridor,  with  drab-coloured 
doors  on  either  side,  each  marked  with  a  number. 
Some  of  them  were  ajar,  and  the  novice  glanced 
into  them  with,  tingling  nerves.  He  was  reassured 
to  catch  a  glimpse  of  cheery  fires,  lines  of  white- 
counterpaned  beds,  and  a  profusion  of  coloured 
texts  upon  the  wall.  The  corridor  opened  upon 
a  small  hall,  with  a  fringe  of  poorly  clad  people 
seated  all  round  upon  benches.  A  young  man, 
with  a  pair  of  scissors  stuck  like  a  flower  in  his 
buttonhole  and  a  note-book  in  his    hand,   was 


12  ROUND   TEE   RED   LAMP. 

passing  from  one  to  the  other,  whispering  and 
writing. 

"  Anything  good  i "  asked  the  third  year's  man» 

"You  should  have  been  here  yesterday,"  said 
the  out-patient  clerk,  glancing  up.  "We  had  a 
regular  field  day.  A  popliteal  aneurism,  a  Colles' 
fracture,  a  spina  bifida,  a  tropical  abscess,  and  an 
elephantiasis.     How's  that  for  a  single  haul  ? " 

"I'm  sorry  I  missed  it.  But  they'll  come 
again,  I  suppose.  What's  up  with  the  old  gen- 
tleman ? " 

A  broken  workman  was  sitting  in  the  shadow, 
rocking  himself  slowly  to  and  fro,  and  groaning. 
A  woman  beside  him  was  trying  to  console  him, 
patting  his  shoulder  with  a  hand  which  was  spot- 
ted over  with  curious  little  white  blisters. 

"  It's  a  fine  carbuncle,"  said  the  clerk,  with  the 
air  of  a  connoisseur  who  describes  his  orchids  to 
one  who  can  appreciate  them.  "It's  on  his  back 
and  the  passage  is  draughty,  so  we  must  not  look 
at  it,  must  we,  daddy?  Pemphigus,"  he  added 
carelessly,  pointing  to  the  woman's  disfigured 
hands.  "Would  you  care  to  stop  and  take  out 
a  metacarpal  ? " 

"No,  thank  you.  We  are  due  at  Archer's. 
Come  on ! "  and  they  rejoined  the  throng  which 
was  hurrying  to  the  theatre  of  the  famous  surgeon. 

The  tiers  of  horseshoe  benches  rising  from  the 
floor  to  the  ceiling  were  already  packed,  and  the 


HIS  FIRST   OPERATION.  13 

novice  as  lie  entered  s?av  vague  curving  lines  of 
faces  in  front  of  him,  and  heard  the  deep  buzz  of 
a  hundred  voices,  and  sounds  of  laughter  from 
somewhere  up  above  him.  His  companion  spied 
an  opening  on  the  second  bench,  and  they  both 
squeezed  into  it. 

"This  is  grand!"  the  senior  man  whispered. 
"  You'll  have  a  rare  view  of  it  all." 

Only  a  single  row  of  heads  intervened  between 
them  and  the  operating  table.  It  was  of  unpaint- 
ed  deal,  plain,  strong,  and  scrupulously  clean.  A 
sheet  of  brown  water- proofing  covered  half  of  it, 
and  beneath  stood  a  large  tin  tray  full  of  sawdust. 
On  the  further  side,  in  front  of  the  window,  there 
was  a  board  which  was  strewed  with  glittering 
instruments  —  forceps,  tenacula,  saws,  canulas, 
and  trocars.  A  line  of  knives,  with  long,  thin, 
delicate  blades,  lay  at  one  side.  Two  young  men 
lounged  in  front  of  this,  one  threading  needles, 
the  other  doing  something  to  a  brass  coffee-pot- 
like thing  which  hissed  out  puffs  of  steam. 

"That's  Peterson,"  whispered  the  senior,  "  the 
big.  bald  man  in  the  front  row.  He's  the  skin- 
grafting  man,  you  know.  And  that's  Anthony 
Browne,  who  took  a  larynx  out  successfully  last 
winter.  And  there's  Murphy,  the  pathologist, 
and  Stoddart,  the  eye-man.  You'll  come  to  know 
them  all  soon."' 

"Who  are  the  two  men  at  the  table?" 


14  ROUND  THE  RED   LAMP. 

"  Nobody— dressers.  One  has  charge  of  the 
instruments  and  the  other  of  the  puffing  Billy. 
It's  Lister's  antiseptic  spray,  you  know,  and 
Archer's  one  of  the  carbolic-acid  men.  Hayes  is 
the  leader  of  the  cleanliness-and-cold- water  school, 
and  they  all  hate  each  other  like  poison." 

A  flutter  of  interest  passed  through  the  closely 
packed  benches  as  a  woman  in  petticoat  and  bod- 
ice was  led  in  by  two  nurses.  A  red  woolen  shawl 
was  draped  over  her  head  and  round  her  neck. 
The  face  which  looked  out  from  it  was  that  of  a 
woman  in  the  prime  of  her  years,  but  drawn  with 
suffering,  and  of  a  peculiar  beeswax  tint.  Her  head 
drooped  as  she  walked,  and  one  of  the  nurses, 
with  her  arm  round  her  waist,  was  whispering 
consolation  in  her  ear.  She  gave  a  quick  side- 
glance  at  the  instrument  table  as  she  passed,  but 
the  nurses  turned  her  away  from  it. 

*'  What  ails  her  ? "  asked  the  novice. 

"Cancer  of  the  parotid.  It's, the  devil  of  a 
case  ;  extends  right  away  back  behind  the  carot- 
ids. There's  hardly  a  man  but  Archer  would 
dare  to  follow  it.     Ah,  here  he  is  himself !  " 

As  he  spoke,  a  small,  brisk,  iron-grey  man  came 
striding  into  the  room,  rubbing  his  hands  together 
as  he  walked.  He  had  a  clean-shaven  face,  of  the 
naval  officer  type,  with  large,  bright  eyes,  and  a 
firm,  straight  mouth.  Behind  him  came  his  big 
house-surgeon,  with  his  gleaming  pince-nez^  and  a 


HIS   FIRST   OPERATION.  I5 

trail  of  dressers,  who  grouped  themselves  into  the 
corners  of  the  room. 

"Gentlemen,"  cried  the  surgeon  in  a  voice  as 
hard  and  brisk  as  his  manner,  "we  have  here  an 
interesting  case  of  tumour  of  the  parotid,  originally 
cartilaginous  but  now  assuming  malignant  charac- 
teristics, and  therefore  requiring  excision.  On  to 
the  table,  nurse  !  Thank  you  !  Chloroform,  clerk  ! 
Thank  you  !     You  can  take  the  shawl  off,  nurse." 

The  woman  lay  back  upon  the  water-proofed 
pillow,  and  her  murderous  tumour  lay  revealed. 
In  itself  it  was  a  pretty  thing — ivory  white,  with 
a  mesh  of  blue  veins,  and  curving  gently  from  jaw 
to  chest.  But  the  lean,  yellow  face  and  the  stringy 
throat  were  in  horrible  contrast  with  the  plump- 
ness and  sleekness  of  this  monstrous  growth. 
The  surgeon  placed  a  hand  on  each  side  of  it 
and  pressed  it  slowly  backwards  and  forwards. 

"Adherent  at  one  place,  gentlemen,"  he  cried. 
"The  growth  involves  the  carotids  and  jugulars, 
and  passes  behind  the  ramus  of  the  jaw,  w^hither 
we  must  be  prepared  to  follow  it.  It  is  impossible 
to  say  how  deep  our  dissection  may  carry  us. 
Carbolic  tray.  Thank  you  !  Dressings  of  carbolic 
gauze,  if  you  please !  Push  the  chloroform,  Mr. 
Johnson.  Have  the  small  saw  ready  in  case  it  is 
necessary  to  remove  the  jaw." 

The  patient  was  moaning  gently  under  the 
towel  which  had  been  placed  over  her  face.     She 


IQ  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

tried  to  raise  her  arms  and  to  draw  up  her' knees, 
but  two  dressers  restrained  her.  The  heavy  air 
was  full  of  the  penetrating  smells  of  carbolic  acid 
and  of  chloroform.  A  muflBled  cry  came  from  un- 
der the  towel,  and  then  a  snatch  of  a  song,  sung 
in  a  high,  quavering,  monotonous  voice : 

"  He  says,  says  he, 
If  you  fly  with  me 
You'll  he  mistress  of  the  ice-cream  van. 
You'll  be  mistress  of  the " 

It  mumbled  off  into  a  drone  and  stopped.  The 
surgeon  came  across,  still  rubbing  his  hands,  and 
spoke  to  an  elderly  man  in  front  of  the  novice. 

"  Narrow  squeak  for  the  Government,"  he  said. 

"Oh,  ten  is  enough." 

"  They  won't  have  ten  long.  They'd  do  better 
to  resign  before  they  are  driven  to  it." 

"  Oh,  I  should  fight  it  out." 

"What's  the  use.  They  can't  get  past  the 
committee  even  if  they  get  a  vot^  in  the  House. 
I  was  talking  to " 

"Patient's  ready,  sir,"  said  the  dresser. 

"Talking  to  McDonald— but  I'll  tell  you  about 
it  presently."  He  walked  back  to  the  patient, 
who  was  breathing  in  long,  heavy  gasps.  "  I  pro- 
pose," said  he,  passing  his  hand  over  the  tumour 
in  an  almost  caressing  fashion,  "to  make  a  free 
incision  over  the  posterior  border,  and  to  take  an- 
other forward  at  right  angles  to  the  lower  end  of 


HIS  FIRST  OPERATION.  17 

it.     Might  I  trouble  you  for  a  medium  knife,  Mr. 
Johnson  ? " 

The  novice,  with  eyes  which  were  dilating  with 
horror,  saw  the  surgeon  pick  up  the  long,  gleam- 
ing knife,  dip  it  into  a  tin  basin,  and  balance  it  in 
his  fingers  as  an  artist  might  his  brush.  Then  he 
saw  him  pinch  up  the  skin  above  the  tumour  with 
his  left  hand.  At  the  sight  his  nerves,  which  had 
already  been  tried  once  or  twice  that  day,  gave 
way  utterly.  His  head  swam  round,  and  he  felt 
that  in  another  instant  he  might  faint.  He  dared 
not  look  at  the  patient.  He  dug  his  thumbs  into 
his  ears  lest  some  scream  should  come  to  haunt 
him,  and  he  fixed  his  eyes  rigidly  upon  the  wood- 
en ledge  in  front  of  him.  One  glance,  one  cry, 
would,  he  knew,  break  down  the  shred  of  self- 
possession  which  he  still  retained.  He  tried  to 
think  of  cricket,  of  green  fields  and  rippling  wa- 
ter, of  his  sisters  at  home— of  anything  rather  than 
of  what  was  going  on  so  near  him. 

And  yet  somehow,  even  with  his  ears  stopped 
up,  sounds  seemed  to  penetrate  to  him  and  to  carry 
their  own  tale.  He  heard,  or  thought  that  he 
heard,  the  long  hissing  of  the  carbolic  engine. 
Then  he  was  conscious  of  some  movement  among 
the  dressers.  Were  there  groans,  too,  breaking 
in  upon  him,  and  some  other  sound,  some  fluid 
sound,  which  was  more  dreadfully  suggestive 
still?    His  mind  would  keep  building  up  every 


18  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

step  of  the  operation,  and  fancy  made  it'  more 
ghastly  than  fact  could  have  been.  His  nerves 
tingled  and  quivered.  Minute  by  minute  the 
giddiness  grew  more  marked,  the  numb,  sickly 
feeling  at  his  heart  more  distressing.  And  then 
suddenly,  with  a  groan,  his  head  pitching  forward, 
and  his  brow  cracking  sharply  upon  the  narrow 
wooden  shelf  in  front  of  him,  he  lay  in  a  dead  faint^ 

When  he  came  to  himself,  he  was  lying  in  the 
empty  theatre,  with  his  collar  and  shirt  undone. 
The  third  year's  man  was  dabbing  a  wet  sponge 
over  his  face,  and  a  couple  of  grinning  dressers 
were  looking  on. 

"All  right,"  cried  the  novice,  sitting  up  and 
rubbing  his  eyes.  "I'm  sorry  to  have  made  an 
ass  of  myself." 

"  Well,  so  I  should  think,"  said  his  companion. 
"What  on  earth  did  you  faint  about  ?" 

"  I  couldn't  help  it.     It  was  that  operation." 

"  What  operation  ? " 

"Why,  that  cancer." 

There  was  a  pause,  and  then  the  three  students 
burst  out  laughing.  "  Why,  you  juggins  !  "  cried 
the  senior  man, "  there  never  was  an  operation  at  all ! 
They  found  the  patient  didn't  stand  the  chloroform 
well,  and  so  the  whole  thing  was  off.  Archer  has 
been  giving  us  one  of  his  racy  lectures,  and  you 
fainted  just  in  the  middle  of  his  favourite  story." 


A  STRAGGLER  OF  '15. 

It  was  a  dull  October  morning,  and  heavy, 
rolling  fog-wreaths  lay  low  over  the  wet  grey 
roofs  of  the  Woolwich  houses.  Down  in  the  long, 
brick-lined  streets  all  was  sodden  and  greasy  and 
cheerless.  From  the  high  dark  buildings  of  the 
arsenal  came  the  whirr  of  many  wheels,  the  thud- 
ding of  weights,  and  the  buzz  and  babel  of  human 
toil.  Beyond,  the  dwellings  of  the  workingmen, 
smoke-stained  and  unlovely,  radiated  away  in  a 
lessening  perspective  of  narrowing  road  and  dwin- 
dling wall. 

There  were  few  folk  in  the  streets,  for  the  toil- 
ers had  all  been  absorbed  since  break  of  day  by  the 
huge  smoke-spouting  monster,  which  sucked  in  the 
manhood  of  the  town,  to  belch  it  forth  weary  and 
work-stained  every  night.  Little  groups  of  chil- 
dren straggled  to  school,  or  loitered  to  peep  through 
the  single,  front  windows  at  the  big,  gilt-edged 
Bibles,  balanced  upon  small,  three-legged  tables, 
which  were  their  usual  adornment.  Stout  women, 
with  thick,  red  arms  and  dirty  aprons,  stood  upon 


20  ROUND   THE   RED   LAMP. 

the  whitened  doorsteps,  leaning  upon  their  brooms, 
and  shrieking  their  morning  greetings  across  the 
road.  One  stouter,  redder,  and  dirtier  than  the 
rest,  had  gathered  a  small  knot  of  cronies  around 
her  and  was  talking  energetically,  with  little 
shrill  titters  from  her  audience  to  punctuate  her 
remarks. 

"Old  enough  to  know  better!"  she  cried,  in 
answer  to  an  exclamation  from  one  of  the  listen- 
ers. "If  he  hain't  no  sense  now,  I  'specs  he 
won't  learn  much  on  this  side  o'  Jordan.  Why, 
'ow  old  is  he  at  alii  Blessed  if  I  could  ever 
make  out." 

"  Well,  it  ain't  so  hard  to  reckon,"  said  a  sharp- 
featured  pale-faced  woman  ^vith  watery  blue  eyes. 
"He's  been  at  the  battle  o'  Waterloo,  and  has  the 
pension  and  medal  to  prove  it." 

"That  were  a  ter'ble  long  time  agone,"  re- 
marked a  third.     "  It  w^ere  afore  I  were  bom." 

"It  were  fifteen  year  after  the  beginnin'  of 
the  century,"  cried  a  younger  woman,  who  had 
stood  leaning  against  the  wall,  with  a  smile  of 
superior  knowledge  upon  her  face.  "My  Bill  was 
a-saying  so  last  Sabbath,  when  I  spoke  to  him  o' 
old  Daddy  Brewster,  here." 

"And  suppose  he  spoke  truth.  Missus  Simp- 
son, 'ow  long  agone  do  that  make  it  ? " 

"  It's  eighty-one  now,."  said  the  original 
speaker,  checking  off  the  years  upon  her  coarse 


A  STRAGGLER  OF  '15.  21 

red  fingers,  "  and  that  were  fifteen.  Ten  and  ten, 
and  ten,  and  ten,  and  ten — why,  it's  only  sixty- 
and-aix  year,  so  he  ain't  so  old  after  all." 

"But  he  weren't  a  newborn  babe  at  the  bat- 
tle, silly  r'  cried  the  young  woman  with  a  chuckle. 
" S'pose  he  were  only  twenty,  then  he  couldn't  be 
less  than  six-and-eighty  now,  at  the  lowest." 

"Aye,  he's  that— every  day  of  it,"  cried  sev- 
eral. 

"I've  had  'boat  enough  of  it,"  remarked  the 
large  woman  gloomily.  "Unless  his  young  niece, 
or  grandniece,  or  whatever  she  is,  come  to-day, 
I'm  off,  and  he  can  find  some  one  else  to  do  his 
work.    Your  own  'ome  first,  says  I." 

"Ain't  he  quiet,  then,  Missus  Simpson?"  asked 
the  youngest  of  the  group. 

"Listen  to  him  now,"  she  answered,  with  her 
hand  half  raised  and  her  head  turned  slantwise 
towards  the  open  door.  From  the  upper  floor 
there  came  a  shuffling,  sliding  sound  with  a  sharp 
tapping  of  a  stick.  "There  he  go  back  and  for- 
rards,  doing  what  he  call  his  sentry  go.  'Arf  the 
night  through  he's  at  that  game,  the  silly  old  jug- 
gins. At  six  o'clock  this  very  mornin'  there  he 
was  beatin'  with  a  stick  at  my  door.  '  Turn  out, 
guard ! '  he  cried,  and  a  lot  more  jargon  that  I  could 
make  nothing  of.  Then  what  with  his  coughin' 
and  'awkin'  and  spittin',  there  ain't  no  gettin'  a 
wink  o'  sleep.     Hark  to  him  now  !  " 


22  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

"Missus  Simpson,  Missus  Simpson!"  cried  a 
cracked  and  querulous  voice  from  above. 

"Thafs  him!"  slie  cried,  nodding  her  head 
with  an  air  of  triumph.  "He  do  go  on  somethin' 
scandalous.     Yes,  Mr.  Brewster,  sir." 

"I  want  my  morning  ration,  Missus  Simpson." 

"It's  just  ready,  Mr.  Brewster,  sir." 

"Blessed  if  he  ain't  like  a  baby  cryin'  for  its 
pap,"  said  the  young  woman. 

"I  feel  as  if  I  could  shake  his  old  bones  up 
sometimes ! "  cried  Mrs.  Simpson  viciously.  "But 
who's  for  a  'arf  of  fourpenny  ? " 

The  whole  company  were  about  to  shuffle  off 
to  the  public  house,  when  a  young  girl  stepped 
across  the  road  and  touched  the  housekeeper  tim- 
idly upon  the  arm.  "I  think  that  is  No.  56 
Arsenal  View,"  she  said.  "Can  you  tell  me  if 
Mr.  Brewster  lives  here  ? " 

The  housekeeper  looked  critically  at  the  new- 
comer. She  was  a  girl  of  about  twenty,  broad- 
faced  and  comely,  with  a  turned-up  nose  and  large, 
honest  grey  eyes.  Her  print  dress,  her  straw  hat, 
with  its  bunch  of  glaring  poppies,  and  the  bundle 
she  carried,  had  all  a  smack  of  the  country. 

"You're  Norah  Brewster,  I  s'pose,"  said  Mrs. 
Simpson,  eyeing  her  up  and  down  with  no  friendly 
gaze. 

"Yes,  I've  come  to  look  after  my  Granduncle 
Gregory." 


A  STRAGGLER  OF  '15.  23 

"And  a  good  job  too,"  cried  the  housekeeper, 
with  a  toss  of  her  head.  "It's  about  time  that 
some  of  his  own  folk  took  a  turn  at  it,  for  I've 
had  enough  of  it.  There  you  are,  young  woman  ! 
In  you  go  and  make  yourself  at  home.  There's 
tea  in  the  caddy  and  bacon  on  the  dresser,  and  the 
old  man  will  be  about  you  if  you  don't  fetch  him 
his  breakfast.  I'll  send  for  my  things  in  the 
evenin'."  With  a  nod  she  strolled  off  witJi  her 
attendant  gossips  in  the  direction  of  the  public 
house. 

Thus  left  to  her  own  devices,  the  country  girl 
walked  into  the  front  room  and  took  off  her  hat 
and  jacket.  It  was  a  low-roofed  apartment  with  a 
sputtering  fire  upon  which  a  small  brass  kettle 
was  singing  cheerily.  A  stained  cloth  lay  over 
half  the  table,  with  an  empty  brown  teapot,  a  loaf 
of  bread,  and  some  coarse  crockery,  Norah  Brew- 
ster looked  rapidly  about  her,  and  in  an  instant 
took  over  her  new  duties.  Ere  five  minutes  had 
passed  the  tea  was  made,  two  slices  of  bacon  were 
frizzling  on  the  pan,  the  table  was  rearranged,  the 
antimacassars  straightened  over  the  sombre  brown 
furniture,  and  the  whole  room  had  taken  a  new 
air  of  comfort  and  neatness.  This  done  she  looked 
round  curiously  at  the  prints  upon  the  walls. 
Over  the  fireplace,  in  a  small,  square  case,  a 
brown  medal  caught  her  eye,  hanging  from  a  strip 
of  purple  ribbon.     Beneath  was  a  slip  of  news 


24  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

paper  cutting.  She  stood  on  her  tiptoes,  with 
her  fingers  on  the  edge  of  the  mantelpiece,  and 
craned  her  neck  np  to  see  it,  glancing  down  from 
time  to  time  at  the  bacon  which  simmered  and 
hissed  beneath  her.  The  cutting  was  yellow  with 
age,  and  ran  in  this  way  : 

"  On  Tuesday  an  interesting  ceremony  was 
performed  at  the  barracks  of  the  Third  Regiment 
of  Guards,  when,  in  the  presence  of  the  Prince 
Regent,  Lord  Hill,  Lord  Saltoun,  and  an  assem- 
blage which  comprised  beauty  as  well  as  valour,  a 
special  medal  was  presented  to  Corporal  Gregory 
Brewster,  of  Captain  Haldaue's  flank  company,  in 
recognition  of  his  gallantry  in  the  recent  great 
battle  in  the  Lowlands.  It  appears  that  on  the 
ever-memorable  18th  of  June  four  companies  of 
the  Third  Guards  and  of  the  Coldstreams,  under 
the  command  of  Colonels  Maitland  and  Byng, 
held  the  important  farmhouse  of  Hougoumont  at 
the  right  of  the  British  position.  At  a  critical 
point  of  the  action  these  troops  found  themselves 
short  of  powder.  Seeing  that  Generals  Foy  and 
Jerome  Buonaparte  were  again  massing  their  in- 
fantry for  an  attack  on  the  position,  Colonel 
Byng  dispatched  Corporal  Brewster  to  the  rear 
to  hasten  up  the  reserve  ammunition.  Brewster 
came  upon  two  powder  tumbrils  of  the  Nassau 
division,  and  succeeded,  after  menacing  the  driv- 
ers with  his  musket,  in  inducing  them  to  convey 


A  STRAGGLER  OF  '15.  25 

their  powder  to  Hougoumont.  In  his  absence, 
however,  the  hedges  surrounding  the  position  had 
been  set  on  fire  by  a  howitzer  battery  of  the 
French,  and  the  passage  of  the  carts  full  of  pow- 
der became  a  most  hazardous  matter.  The  first 
tumbril  exploded,  blowing  the  driver  to  frag- 
ments. Daunted  by  the  fate  of  his  comrade,  the 
second  driver  turned  his  horses,  but  Corporal 
Brew^ster,  springing  upon  his  seat,  hurled  the  man 
down,  and  urging  the  powder  cart  through  the 
flames,  succeeded  in  forcing  his  way  to  his  com- 
panions. To  this  gallant  deed  may  be  directly 
attributed  the  success  of  the  British  arms,  for 
without  powder  it  would  have  been  impossible  to 
have  held  Hougoumont,  and  the  Duke  of  Well- 
ington had  repeatedly  declared  that  had  Hougou- 
mont fallen,  as  well  as  La  Haye  Sainte,  he  would 
have  found  it  impossible  to  have  held  his  ground. 
Long  may  the  heroic  Brewster  live  to  treasure  the 
medal  which  he  has  so  bravely  won,  and  to  look 
back  with  pride  to  the  day  when,  in  the  presence 
of  his  comrades,  he  received  this  tribute  to  his 
valour  from  the  august  hands  of  the  first  gentle- 
man of  the  realm." 

The  reading  of  this  old  cutting  increased  in 
the  girl's  mind  the  veneration  which  she  had 
always  had  for  her  w^arrior  kinsman.  From  her 
infancy  he  had  been  her  hero,  and  she  remembered 
how  her  father  used  to  speak  of  his  courage  and 


26  ROUND   THE  RED  LAMP. 

his  strength,  how  he  could  strike  down  a  bul- 
lock with  a  blow  of  his  fist  and  carry  a  fat  sheep 
under  either  arm.  True,  she  had  never  seen  him, 
but  a  rude  painting  at  home  which  depicted  a 
square-faced,  clean-shaven,  stalwart  man  with  a 
great  bearskin  cap,  rose  ever  before  her  memory 
when  she  thought  of  him. 

She  was  still  gazing  at  the  brown  medal  and 
wondering  what  the  ^'■Dulce  et  decorum  est "  might 
mean,  which  was  inscribed  upon  the  edge,  when 
there  came  a  sudden  tapping  and  shuffling  upon 
the  stair,  and  there  at  the  door  was  standing 
the  very  man  who  had  been  so  often  in  her 
thoughts. 

But  could  this  indeed  be  he  ?  Where  was  the 
martial  air,  the  flashing  eye,  the  warrior  face 
which  she  had  pictured  ?  There,  framed  in  the 
doorway,  was  a  huge  twisted  old  man,  gaunt  and 
puckered,  with  twitching  hands  and  shuffling, 
purposeless  feet.  A  cloud  of  fluffy  white  hair,  a 
red- veined  nose,  two  thick  tufts  of  eyebrow  and  a 
pair  of  dimly  questioning,  watery  blue  ej^es — these 
were  what  met  her  gaze.  He  leaned  forward  upon 
a  stick,  while  his  shoulders  rose  and  fell  with  his 
crackling,  rasping  breathing. 

"I  want  my  morning  rations,"  he  crooned,  as 
he  stumped  forward  to  his  chair.  "  The  cold  nips 
me  without  'em.  See  to  my  fingers  !  "  He  held 
out  his  distorted  hands,   all    blue  at    the  tips, 


A  STRAGGLER  OF  '15.  27 

wrinkled  and  gnarled,  with  linge,  projecting 
knuckles. 

"  It's  nigh  ready,"  answered  the  girl,  gazing  at 
him  with  wonder  in  her  eyes.  "Don't  you  know 
who  I  am,  granduncle  ?  I  am  Norah  Brewster 
from  Witham." 

"Rum  is  warm,"  mumbled  the  old  man,  rock- 
ing to  and  fro  in  his  chair,  "and  schnapps  is 
warm,  and  there's  'eat  in  soup,  but  it's  a  dish  o' 
tea  for  me.     What  did  you  say  your  name  was  ?  " 

"  Norah  Brewster." 

"  You  can  speak  out,  lass.  Seems  to  me  folk's 
voices  isn't  as  loud  as  they  used." 

"I'm  Norah  Brewster,  uncle.  I'm  your  grand- 
niece  come  down  from  Essex  way  to  live  with 
you." 

"  You'll  be  brother  Jarge's  girl !  Lor,  to  think 
o'  little  Jarge  having  a  girl!"  He  chuckled 
hoarsely  to  himself,  and  the  long,  stringy  sinews 
of  his  throat  jerked  and  quivered. 

"  I  am  the  daughter  of  your  brother  George's 
son,"  said  she,  as  she  turned  the  bacon. 

"  Lor,  but  little  Jarge  was  a  rare  un  !  "  he  con- 
tinued. "Eh,  by  Jimini,  there  was  no  chousing 
Jarge.  He's  got  a  bull  pup  o'  mine  that  I  gave 
him  when  I  took  the  bounty.  You've  heard  him 
speak  of  it,  likely  ? " 

"Why,  grandpa  George  has  been  dead  this 
twenty  year,"  said  she,  pouring  out  the  tea. 


28 


ROUND   THE  RED  LAMP. 


"  Well,  it  was  a  bootiful  pup— aye,  a-  well- 
bred  un,  by  Jimini !  I'm  cold  for  lack  o'  my  ra- 
tions. Rum  is  good,  and  so  is  schnapps,  but  I'd 
as  lief  have  tea  as  either." 

He  breathed  heavily  while  he  devoured  his 
food.  "It's  a  middlin'  goodish  way  you've  come," 
said  he  at  last.  "  Likely  the  stage  left  yester- 
night." 

"The  what,  uncle?" 

"  The  coach  that  brought  you." 

"  Nay,  I  came  by  the  mornin'  train." 

"  Lor,  now,  think  o'  that !  You  ain't  afeard  o' 
those  newfangled  things  !  By  Jimini,  to  think  of 
you  comin'  by  railroad  like  that!  What's  the 
world  a- comin'  to  !  " 

There  was  silence  for  some  minutes  while 
Norah  sat  stirring  her  tea  and  glancing  sideways 
at  the  bluish  lips  and  champing  jaws  of  her  com- 
panion. 

"You  must  have  seen  a  deal  o'  life,  uncle," 
said  she.  "It  must  seem  a  long,  long  time  to 
you ! " 

"  Not  so  very  long  neither.  I'm  ninety,  come 
Candlemas ;  but  it  don't  seem  long  since  I  took  the 
bounty.  And  that  battle,  it  might  have  been 
yesterday.  Eh,  but  I  get  a  power  o'  good  from 
my  rations ! "  He  did  indeed  look  less  worn  and 
colourless  than  when  she  first  saw  him.  His  face 
was  flushed  and  his  back  more  erect. 


A  STRAGGLER  OF  '15.  29 

"  Have  you  read  that  ?  "  he  asked,  jerking  his 
head  towards  the  cutting. 

"  Yes,  uncle,  and  I'm  sure  you  must  be  proud 
of  it." 

"  Ah,  it  was  a  great  day  for  me  !  A  great  day  1 
The  Regent  was  there,  and  a  fine  body  of  a  man 
too  !  '  The  ridgment  is  proud  of  you,'  says  he. 
'And  I'm  proud  of  the  ridgment,'  say  I.  'A 
damned  good  answer  too  ! '  says  he  to  Lord  Hill, 
and  they  both  bu'st  out  a-laughin'.  But  what  be 
you  a-peepin'  out  o'  the  window  for  ? " 

"  Oh,  uncle,  here's  a  regiment  of  soldiers  com- 
ing down  the  street  with  the  band  playing  in 
front  of  them." 

"A  ridgment,  eh?  Where  be  my  glasses? 
Lor,  but  I  can  hear  the  band,  as  plain  as  plain  ! 
Here's  the  pioneers  an'  the  drum-major!  What 
be  their  number,  lass  ? "  His  eyes  were  shining 
and  his  bony  yellow  fingers,  like  the  claws  of  some 
fierce  old  bird,  dug  into  her  shoulder. 

"They  don't  seem  to  have  no  number,  uncle. 
They've  something  wrote  on  their  shoulders.  Ox- 
fordshire, I  think  it  be." 

"Ah,  yes!  "he  growled.  "I  heard  as  they'd 
dropped  the  numbers  and  given  them  newfangled 
names.  There  they  go,  by  Jimini!  They're 
young  mostly,  but  they  hain't  forgot  how  to 
march.  They  have  the  swing — aye,  I'll  say  that 
for  them.     They've  got  the  swing."     He  gazed 


30  ROUND   THE  RED   LAMP. 

after  them  until  the  last  files  had  turned  the  corner 
and  the  measured  tramp  of  their  marching  had 
died  away  in  the  distance. 

He  had  just  regained  his  chair  when  the  door 
opened  and  a  gentleman  stepped  in. 

' '  Ah,  Mr.  Brewster !    Better  to-  day  ? "  he  asked . 

"Come  in,  doctor!  Yes,  I'm  better.  But 
there's  a  deal  o'  bubbling  in  my  chest.  It's  all 
them  toobes.  If  I  could  but  cut  the  phlegm,  I'd 
be  right.  Can't  you  give  me  something  to  cut  the 
phlegm  ? " 

The  doctor,  a  grave-faced  young  man,  put  his 
fingers  to  the  furrowed,  blue- corded  wrist. 

"  You  must  be  careful,"  he  said.  "  You  must 
take  no  liberties."  The  thin  tide  of  life  seemed 
to  thrill  rather  than  to  throb  under  his  finger. 

The  old  man  chuckled. 

"  I've  got  brother  Jarge's  girl  to  look  after  me 
now.  She'll  see  I  don't  break  barracks  or  do 
what  I  hadn't  ought  to.  Why,  dam  my  skin,  I 
knew  something  was  amiss  !  " 

"With  what?" 

"  Why,  with  them  soldiers.  You  saw  them 
pass,  doctor— eh?  They'd  forgot  their  stocks. 
Not  one  on  'em  had  his  stock  on."  He  croaked 
and  chuckled  for  a  long  time  over  his  discovery. 
"It  wouldn't  ha'  done  for  the  Dook !  "  he  mut- 
tered. "No,  by  Jimini !  the  Dook  would  ha'  had 
a  word  there." 


A  STRAGGLER  OP  '15.  31 

The  doctor  smiled.  "Well,  you  are  doing 
very  well,"  said  he.  "  I'll  look  in  once  a  week  or 
so,  and  see  how  you  are."  As  Norah  followed 
him  to  the  door,  he  beckoned  her  outside. 

"He  is  very  weak,"  he  whispered.  "If  you 
find  him  failing  you  must  send  for  me." 

"  What  ails  him,  doctor  ? " 

"  Ninety  years  ails  him.  His  arteries  are  pipes 
of  lime.  His  heart  is  shrunken  and  flabby.  The 
man  is  worn  out." 

Norah  stood  watching  the  brisk  figure  of  the 
young  doctor,  and  pondering  over  these  new  re- 
sponsibilities which  had  come  upon  her.  When 
she  turned  a  tall,  brow^n  faced  artilleryman,  with 
the  three  gold  chevrons  of  sergeant  upon  his  arm, 
was  standing,  carbine  in  hand,  at  her  elbow, 

"Good-morning,  miss,"  said  he,  raising  one 
thick  finger  to  his  Jaunty,  yellow-banded  cap.  "  I 
b'lieve  there's  an  old  gentleman  lives  here  of  the 
name  of  Brewster,  who  was  engaged  in  the  battle 
o'  Waterloo  ? "  * 

"  It's  my  granduncle,  sir,"  said  Norah,  casting 
down  her  eyes  before  the  keen,  critical  gaze  of  the 
young  soldier.     "  He  is  in  the  front  parlour." 

"  Could  I  have  a  w^ord  with  him,  miss  ?  I'll 
call  again  if  it  don't  chance  to  be  convenient." 

"  I  am  sure  that  he  would  be  very  glad  to  see 
you,  sir.  He's  in  here,  if  you'll  step  in.  Uncle, 
here's  a  gentleman  who  wants  to  speak  with  you." 


32  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

"  Proud  to  see  you,  sir — proud  and  glad,-  sir  ! " 
cried  the  sergeant,  takingjhree  steps  forward  into 
the  room,  and  grounding  his  carbine  while  he 
raised  his  hand,  palm  forwards,  in  a  salute. 
Norah  stood  by  the  door,  with  her  mouth  and 
eyes  open,  wondering  if  her  granduncle  had  ever, 
in  his  prime,  looked  like  this  magnificent  creature, 
and  whether  he,  in  his  turn,  would  ever  come  to 
resemble  her  granduncle. 

The  old  man  blinked  up  at  his  visitor,  and 
shook  his  head  slowly.  "  Sit  ye  down,  sergeant," 
said  he,  pointing  with  his  stick  to  a  chair. 
"You're  full  young  for  the  stripes.  Lordy,  it's 
easier  to  get  three  now  than  one  in  my  day.  Gun- 
ners were  old  soldiers  then  and  the  grey  hairs 
came  quicker  than  the  three  stripes." 

"I  am  eight  years'  service,  sir,"  cried  the  ser- 
geant. "Macdonald  is  my  name — Sergeant  Mac- 
donald,  of  H  Battery,  Southern  Artillery  Division. 
I  have  called  as  the  spokesman  of  my  mates  at 
the  gunner's  barracks  to  say  that  we  are  proud  to 
have  you  in  the  town,  sir." 

Old  Brewster  chuckled  and  rubbed  his  bony 
hands.  "That  were  what  the  Regent  said,"  he 
cried.  "  'The  ridgment  is  proud  of  ye,'  says  he. 
'And  I  am  proud  of  the  ridgment,'  says  I.  'And 
a  damned  good  answer  too,'  says  he,  and  he  and 
Lord  Hill  bu'st  out  a-laughin'." 

"The  non-commissioned  mess  would  be  proud 


A  STRAGGLER  OF  '15.  33 

and  honoured  to  see  you,  sir,"  said  Sergeant  Mac- 
donald  ;  "and  if  you  could  step  as  far  you'll 
always  find  a  pipe  o'  baccy  and  a  glass  o'  grog 
a-waitin'  you." 

The  old  man  laughed  until  he  coughed.  "  Like 
to  see  me,  would  they?  The  dogs!"  said  he. 
"  Well,  well,  when  the  warm  weather  comes  again 
I'll  maybe  drop  in.  Too  grand  for  a  canteen,  eh  ? 
Got  your  mess  just  the  same  as  the  orficers. 
What's  the  world  a-comin'  to  at  all !  " 

"  You  was  in  the  line,  sir,  was  you  not  ? "  asked 
the  sergeant  respectfully. 

"The  line?"  cried  the  old  man,  with  shrill 
scorn.  "Never  wore  a  shako  in  my  life.  I  am  a 
guardsman,  I  am.  Served  in  the  Third  Guards— 
the  same  they  call  now  the  Scots  Guards.  Lordy, 
but  they  have  all  marched  away — every  man  of 
them— from  old  Colonel  Byng  down  to  the  drum- 
mer boys,  and  here  am  I  a  straggler— that's  what 
I  am,  sergeant,  a  straggler !  I'm  here  when  I  ought 
to  be  there.  But  it  ain't  my  fault  neither,  for  I'm 
ready  to  fall  in  when  the  word  comes." 

"  We've  all  got  to  muster  there,"  answered  the 
sergeant.  "  Won't  you  try  my  baccy,  sir  ? "  hand- 
ing over  a  sealskin  pouch. 

Old  Brewster  drew  a  blackened  clay  pipe  from 
his  pocket,  and  began  to  stuff  the  tobacco  into 
the  bowl.  In  an  instant  it  slipped  through  his 
fingers,  and  was  broken  to  pieces  on  the  floor. 


34-  ROUND   THE   RED  LAMP. 

His  lip  quivered,  his  nose  i:)uckered  up,  and  he 
began  crying  with  the  long,  helpless  sobs  of  a 
child.     "  I've  broke  my  pipe,"  he  cried. 

"Don't,  uncle  ;  oh,  don't !  "  cried  Norah,  bend- 
ing over  him,  and  patting  his  white  head  as  one 
soothes  a  baby.  "  It  don't  matter.  We  can  easy 
get  another." 

"Don't  you  fret  yourself,  sir,"  said  the  ser- 
geant. "'Ere's  a  wooden  pipe  with  an  amber 
mouth,  if  you'll  do  me  the  honour  to  accept  it 
from  me.     I'd  be  real  glad  if  you  will  take  it." 

"  Jimini !  "  cried  he,  his  smiles  breaking  in  an 
instant  through  his  tears.  "  It's  a  fine  pipe.  See 
to  my  new  pipe,  Norah.  I  lay  that  Jarge  never 
had  a  pipe  like  that.  You've  got  your  firelock 
there,  sergeant?" 

"  Yes,  sir.  I  was  on  my  way  back  from  the 
butts  when  I  looked  in." 

"Let  me  have  the  feel  of  it.  Lordy,  but  it 
seems  like  old  times  to  have  one's  hand  on  a  mus- 
ket. "What's  the  manual,  sergeant,  eh?  Cock 
your  firelock — look  to  your  priming — present  your 
firelock — eh,  sergeant?  Oh,  Jimini,  I've  broke 
your  musket  in  halves  !  " 

"That's  all  right,  sir,"  cried  the  gunner  laugh- 
ing. "You  pressed  on  the  lever  and  opened  the 
breech-piece.  That's  where  we  load  'em,  you 
know." 

"Load  'em  at  the  wrong  end!     Well,  well,  to 


A  STRAGGLER  OF  '15.  35 

think  o'  that !  And  no  ramrod  neither !  I've 
heard  tell  of  it,  but  I  never  believed  it  afore.  Ah ! 
it  won't  come  up  to  brown  Bess.  When  there's 
work  to  be  done,  you  mark  my  word  and  see  if 
they  don't  come  back  to  brown  Bess." 

"By  the  Lord,  sir!"  cried  the  sergeant  hotly, 
"  they  need  some  change  out  in  South  Africa  now. 
I  see  by  this  mornin's  paper  that  the  Government 
has  knuckled  under  to  these  Boers.  They're  hot 
about  it  at  the  non-com.  mess,  I  can  tell  you,  sir." 

"Eh — eh,"  croaked  old  Brewster.  "By  Jim- 
ini !  it  wouldn't  ha'  done  for  the  Dook  ;  the  Dook 
would  ha'  had  a  word  to  say  over  that." 

"Ah,  that  he  would,  sir ! "  cried  the  sergeant ; 
"and  God  send  us  another  like  him.  But  I've 
wearied  you  enough  for  one  sitting.  I'll  look  in 
again,  and  I'll  bring  a  comrade  or  two  with  me,  if 
I  may,  for  there  isn't  one  but  would  be  proud  to 
have  speech  with  you." 

So,  with  another  salute  to  the  veteran  and  a 
gleam  of  white  teeth  at  Norah,  the  big  gunner 
withdrew,  leaving  a  memory  of  blue  cloth  and  of 
gold  braid  behind  him.  Many  days  had  not 
passed,  however,  before  he  was  back  again,  and 
during  all  the  long  winter  he  was  a  frequent  vis- 
itor at  Arsenal  View.  There  came  a  time,  at  last, 
when  it  might  be  doubted  to  which  of  the  two 
occupants  his  visits  were  directed,  nor  was  it  hard 
to  say  by  which  he  was  most  anxiously  awaited. 


36  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

He  brought  others  with  him  ;  and  soon,  through 
all  the  lines,  a  pilgrimage  to  Daddy  Brewster's 
came  to  be  looked  upon  as  the  proper  thing  to  do. 
Gunners  and  sappers,  linesmen  and  dragoons, 
came  bowing  and  bobbing  into  the  little  parlour, 
with  clatter  of  side  arms  and  clink  of  spurs, 
stretching  their  long  legs  across  the  patchwork 
rug,  and  hunting  in  the  front  of  their  tunics  for 
the  screw  of  tobacco  or  paper  of  snuff  which  they 
had  brought  as  a  sign  of  their  esteem. 

It  was  a  deadly  cold  winter,  with  six  weeks  on 
end  of  snow  on  the  ground,  and  Norah  had  a  hard 
task  to  keep  the  life  in  that  time-w^orn  body. 
There  were  times  when  his  mind  would  leave  him, 
and  when,  save  an  animal  outcry  when  the  hour 
of  his  meals  came  round,  no  word  would  fall  from 
him.  He  was  a  white-haired  child,  with  all  a 
child's  troubles  and  emotions.  As  the  warm 
weather  came  once  more,  however,  and  the  green 
buds  peeped  forth  again  upon  the  trees,  the  blood 
thawed  in  his  veins,  and  he  w^ould  even  drag  him- 
self as  far  as  the  door  to  bask  in  the  life-giving 
sunshine. 

"It  do  hearten  me  up  so,"  he  said  one  morn- 
ing, as  he  glowed  in  the  hot  May  sun.  "It's  a 
job  to  keep  back  the  flies,  though.  They  get  ow- 
dacious  in  this  weather,  and  they  do  plague  me 
cruel." 

"I'll  keep  them  off  you,  uncle,"  said  Norah. 


A  STRAGGLER  OP  '15.  37 

"Ell,  but  it's  fine!  This  sunshine  makes  me 
think  o'  the  glory  to  come.  You  might  read  me  a 
bit  o'  the  Bible,  lass.  I  find  it  wonderful  sooth- 
ing." 

"  What  part  would  you  like,  uncle  ? " 

"Oh,  them  wars." 

"The  wars?" 

"Aye,  keep  to  the  wars!  Give  me  the  Old 
Testament  for  choice.  There's  more  taste  to  it,  to 
my  mind.  When  parson  comes  he  wants  to  get 
off  to  something  else ;  but  it's  Joshua  or  nothing 
with  me.  Them  Israelites  was  good  soldiers — 
good  growed  soldiers,  all  of  'em." 

"But,  uncle,"  pleaded  Norah,  "it's  all  peace 
in  the  next  world." 

"No,  it  ain't,  gal." 

"Oh,  yes,  uncle,  surely!" 

The  old  corporal  knocked  his  stick  irritably 
upon  the  ground.  ' '  I  tell  ye  it  ain'  t,  gal.  I  asked 
parson." 

"  WeU,  what  did  he  say  ? " 

"  He  said  there  was  to  be  a  last  fight.  He  even 
gave  it  a  name,  he  did.  The  battle  of  Arm — 
Arm " 

"Armageddon." 

"Aye,  that's  the  name  parson  said.  I  'specs 
the  Third  Guards'll  be  there.  And  the  Book — 
the  Dook'U  have  a  word  to  say." 

An  elderly,  grey- whiskered  gentleman  had  been 


38  TwOUND  THE   RED   LAMP. 

walking  down  the  street,  glancing  up  at  the  num- 
bers of  the  houses.  Now  as  his  eyes  fell  upon  the 
old  man,  he  came  straight  for  him. 

"  Hullo  !  "  said  he  ;  "  perhaps  you  are  Gregory- 
Brewster  ? " 

"My  name,  sir,"  answered  the  veteran. 

"You  are  the  same  Brewster,  as  I  understand, 
who  is  on  the  roll  of  the  Scots  Guards  as  having 
been  present  at  the  battle  of  "Waterloo  ? " 

"I  am  that  man,  sir,  though  we  called  it  the 
Third  Guards  in  those  days.  It  was  a  fine  ridg- 
ment,  and  they  only  need  me  to  make  up  a  full 
muster." 

"  Tut,  tut !  they'll  have  to  wait  years  for  that," 
said  the  gentleman  heartily.  "But  I  am  the  colo- 
nel of  the  Scots  Guards,  and  I  thought  I  would 
like  to  have  a  word  with  you." 

Old  Gregory  Brew^ster  was  up  in  an  instant, 
with  his  hand  to  his  rabbit-skin  cap.  "God 
bless  me!"  he  cried,  "to  think  of  it!  to  think 
of  it ! " 

"Hadn't  the  gentleman  better  come  in ? "  sug- 
gested the  practical  Norah  from  behind  the  door. 

"  Surely,  sir,  surely ;  walk  in,  sir,  if  I  may  be 
so  bold."  In  his  excitement  he  had  forgotten  his 
stick,  and  as  he  led  the  way  into  the  parlour  his 
knees  tottered,  and  he  threw  out  his  hands.  In 
an  instant  the  colonel  had  caught  him  on  one  side 
and  Norah  on  the  other. 


A  STRAGGLER  OF   '15.  39 

"Easy  and  steady,"  said  the  colonel,  as  he  led 
him  to  his  armchair. 

"Thank  ye,  sir;  I  was  near  gone  that  time. 
But,  Lordy !  why,  I  can  scarce  believe  it.  To 
think  of  me  the  corporal  of  the  flank  company 
and  you  the  colonel  of  the  battalion  !  How  things 
come  round,  to  be  sure  !  " 

"Why,  we  are  very  proud  of  you  in  London," 
said  the  colonel.  "And  so  you  are  actually  one 
of  tlie  men  who  held  Hougoumont."  He  looked  at 
the  bony,  trembling  hands,  with  their  huge,  knot- 
ted knuckles,  the  stringy  throat,  and  the  heaving, 
rounded  shoulders.  Could  this,  indeed,  be  the 
last  of  that  band  of  heroes  1  Then  he  glanced  at 
the  half -filled  phials,  the  blue  liniment  bottles,  the 
long-spouted  kettle,  and  the  sordid  details  of  the 
sick  room.  "Better,  surely,  had  he  died  under 
the  blazing  rafters  of  the  Belgian  farmhouse," 
thought  the  colonel. 

"I  hope  that  you  are  pretty  comfortable  and 
happy,"  he  remarked  after  a  pause. 

"Thank  ye,  sir.  I  have  a  good  deal  o'  trouble 
with  my  toobes — a  deal  o'  trouble.  You  wouldn't 
think  the  job  it  is  to  cut  the  phlegm.  And  I  need 
my  rations.  I  gets  cold  without  'em.  And  the 
flies!  I  ain't  strong  enough  to  fight  against 
them." 

"  How's  the  memory  1 "  asked  the  colonel. 

"  Oh,  there  ain't  nothing  amiss  there.     Why, 


40  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

sir,  I  could  give  you  the  uame  of  every  man  in 
Captain  Haldane's  flank  company." 

''  And  tlie  battle — you  remember  it  ? " 

"  Why,  I  sees  it  all  afore  me  every  time  I  shuts 
my  eyes.  Lordy,  sir,  you  wouldn't  hardly  believe 
how  clear  it  is  to  me.  There's  our  line  from  the 
paregoric  bottle  right  along  to  the  snuffbox. 
D'ye  see  ?  Well,  then,  the  pill  box  is  for  Hougou- 
mont  on  the  right — where  we  was — and  Norah's 
thimble  for  La  Haye  Sainte.  There  it  is,  all 
right,  sir;  and  here  were  our  guns,  and  here  be- 
hind the  reserves  and  the  Belgians.  Ach,  them 
Belgians ! "  He  spat  furiously  into  the  fire. 
"Then  here's  the  French,  where  my  pipe  lies; 
and  over  here,  where  I  put  my  baccy  pouch,  was 
the  Proosians  a-comin'  up  on  our  left  flank.  Jim- 
ini,  but  it  was  a  glad  sight  to  see  the  smoke  of 
their  guns ! " 

"And  what  was  it  that  struck  you  most  now 
in  connection  with  the  whole  affair?"  asked  the 
colonel. 

"I  lost  three  half-crowns  over  it,  I  did," 
crooned  old  Brewster.  "I  shouldn't  wonder  if  I 
was  never  to  get  that  money  now.  I  lent  'em  to 
Jabez  Smith,  my  rear  rank  man,  in  Brussels. 
'  Only  till  pay-day.  Grig,'  says  he.  By  Gosh  !  he 
was  stuck  by  a  lancer  at  Quatre  Bras,  and  me  with 
not  so  much  as  a  slip  o'  paper  to  prove  the  debt ! 
Them  three  half-crowns  is  as  good  as  lost  to  me." 


A  STRAGGLER  OP  '15.  41 

The  colonel  rose  from  his  chair  laughing. 
"The  officers  of  the  Guards  want  you  to  buy 
yourself  some  little  trifle  which  may  add  to  your 
comfort,"  he  said.  "It  is  not  from  me,  so  you 
need  not  thank  me."  He  took  up  the  old  man's 
tobacco  pouch  and  slipped  a  crisp  banknote  in- 
side it. 

"  Thank  ye  kindly,  sir.  But  there's  one  favour 
that  I  would  like  to  ask  you,  colonel." 

"Yes,  my  man." 

"If  I'm  called,  colonel,  you  won't  grudge  me  a 
flag  and  a  firing  party?  I'm  not  a  civilian;  I'm 
a  guardsman — I'm  the  last  of  the  old  Third 
Guards." 

"All  right,  my  man,  I'll  see  to  it,"  said  the 
colonel.  "Good-bye  ;  I  hope  to  have  nothing  but 
good  news  from  you." 

"A  kind  gentleman,  Norah,"  croaked  old 
Brewster,  as  they  saw  him  walk  past  the  window ; 
"but,  Lordy,  he  ain't  fit  to  hold  the  stirrup  o' 
my  Colonel  Byng ! " 

It  was  on  the  very  next  day  that  the  old  cor- 
poral took  a  sudden  change  for  the  worse.  Even 
the  golden  sunlight  streaming  through  the  window 
seemed  unable  to  warm  that  withered  frame.  The 
doctor  came  and  shook  his  head  in  silence.  All 
day  the  man  lay  with  only  his  j)uffing  blue  lips 
and  the  twitching  of  his  scraggy  neck  to  show 
that  he  still  held  the  breath  of  life.     Norah  and 


42  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

Sergeant  Macdonald  had  sat  by  him  in  the  after- 
noon, but  he  had  shown  no  consciousness  of  their 
presence.  He  lay  peacefully,  his  eyes  half  closed, 
his  hands  under  his  cheek,  as  one  who  is  very 
weary. 

They  had  left  him  for  an  instant  and  were  sit- 
ting in  the  front  room,  where  Norah  was  preparing 
tea,  when  of  a  sudden  they  heard  a  shout  that 
rang  through  the  house.  Loud  and  clear  and 
swelling,  it  pealed  in  their  ears — a  voice  full  of 
strength  and  energy  and  fiery  passion.  "The 
Guards  need  powder !  "  it  cried  ;  and  yet  again, 
"  The  Guards  need  powder !  " 

The  sergeant  sprang  from  his  chair  and  rushed 
in,  followed  by  the  trembling  Norah.  There  was 
the  old  man  standing  up,  his  blue  eyes  sparkling, 
his  white  hair  bristling,  his  whole  figure  towering 
and  expanding,  with  eagle  head  and  glance  of  fire. 
"The  Guards  need  powder!"  he  thundered  once 
again,  "and,  by  God,  they  shall  have  it!"  He 
threw  up  his  long  arms,  and  sank  back  with  a 
groan  into  his  chair.  The  sergeant  stooped  over 
him,  and  his  face  darkened. 

"Oh,  Archie,  Archie,"  sobbed  the  frightened 
girl,  "  what  do  you  think  of  him  ? " 

The  sergeant  turned  away.  "I  think,"  said 
he,  "that  the  Third  Guards  have  a  full  muster 
now." 


THE  THIRD   GENERATION. 

ScuDAMORE  Lane,  sloping  down  riverwards 
from  Just  behind  the  Monument,  lies  at  night  in 
the  shadow  of  two  black  and  monstrous  walls 
which  loom  high  above  the  glimmer  of  the  scat- 
tered gas  lamps.  The  footpaths  are  narrow,  and 
the  causeway  is  paved  with  rounded  cobblestones, 
so  that  the  endless  drays  roar  along  it  like  break- 
ing waves.  A  few  old-fashioned  houses  lie  scat- 
tered among  the  business  premises,  and  in  one 
of  these,  half-way  down  on  the  left-hand  side, 
Dr.  Horace  Selby  conducts  his  large  practice.  It 
is  a  singular  street  for  so  big  a  man ;  but  a  spe- 
cialist who  has  an  European  reputation  can  afford 
to  live  where  he  likes.  In  his  particular  branch, 
too,  patients  do  not  always  regard  seclusion  as  a 
disadvantage. 

It  was  only  ten  o'clock.  The  dull  roar  of  the 
traflSic  which  converged  all  day  upon  London 
Bridge  had  died  away  now  to  a  mere  confused 
murmur.  It  was  raining  heavily,  and  the  gas 
shone  dimly  through  the  streaked  and  dripping 


44  ROUND   THE  RED  LAMP. 

glass,  throwing  little  circles  upon  the  glistening 
cobblestones.  The  air  was  full  of  the  sounds  of 
the  rain,  the  thin  swish  of  its  fall,  the  heavier 
drip  from  the  eaves,  and  the  swirl  and  gurgle 
down  the  two  steep  gutters  and  through  the 
sewer  grating.  There  was  only  one  figure  in  the 
whole  length  of  Scudamore  Lane.  It  was  that 
of  a  man,  and  it  stood  outside  the  door  of  Dr. 
Horace  Selby. 

He  had  just  rung  and  was  waiting  for  an  an- 
swer. The  fanlight  beat  full  ujjon  the  gleaming 
shoulders  of  his  waterproof  and  upon  his  up- 
turned features.  It  was  a  wan,  sensitive,  clear-cut 
face,  with  some  subtle,  nameless  peculiarity  in  its 
expression,  something  of  the  startled  horse  in  the 
white-rimmed  eye,  something  too  of  the  helpless 
child  in  the  drawn  cheek  and  the  weakening  of 
the  lower  lip.  The  man-servant  knew  the  stranger 
as  a  patient  at  a  bare  glance  at  those  frightened 
eyes.  Such  a  look  had  been  seen  at  that  door 
many  times  before. 

"  Is  the  doctor  in  ? " 

The  man  hesitated. 

"  He  has  had  a  few  friends  to  dinner,  sir.  He 
does  not  like  to  be  disturbed  outside  his  usual 
hours,  sir." 

"Tell  him  that  I  must  see  him.  Tell  him  that 
it  is  of  the  very  first  importance.  Here  is  my 
card."    He  fumbled  with  his  trembling  fingers  in 


THE   THIRD   GENERATION.  45 

trying  to  draw  one  from  his  case.  "  Sir  Francis 
Norton  is  the  name.  Tell  him  that  Sir  Francis 
Norton,  of  Deane  Park,  must  see  him  without 
delay." 

"  Yes,  sir."  The  butler  closed  his  fingers  upon 
the  card  and  the  half-sovereign  which  accom- 
panied it.  "Better  hang  your  coat  up  here  in 
the  hall.  It  is  very  wet.  Now  if  you  will  wait 
here  in  the  consulting-room,  I  have  no  doubt  that 
I  shall  be  able  to  send  the  doctor  in  to  you." 

It  was  a  large  and  lofty  room  in  which  the 
young  baronet  found  himself.  The  carpet  was  so 
soft  and  thick  that  his  feet  made  no  sound  as  he 
walked  across  it.  The  two  gas  jets  were  turned 
only  half-way  up,  and  the  dim  light  with  the 
faint  aromatic  smell  which  filled  the  air  had  a 
vaguely  religious  suggestion.  He  sat  down  in  a 
shining  leather  armchair  by  the  smouldering  fire 
and  looked  gloomily  about  him.  Two  sides  of  the 
room  were  taken  up  with  books,  fat  and  sombre, 
with  broad  gold  lettering  upon  their  backs.  Be- 
side him  was  the  high,  old-fashioned  mantelpiece 
of  white  marble — the  top  of  it  strewed  with  cotton 
wadding  and  bandages,  graduated  measures,  and 
little  bottles.  There  was  one  with  a  broad  neck 
just  above  him  containing  bluestone,  and  another 
narrower  one  with  what  looked  like  the  ruins  of  a 
broken  pipestem  and  "Caustic"  outside  upon  a 
red  label.     Thermometers,  hypodermic  syringes 


46  ROUND   THE   RED   LAMP. 

bistouries  and  spatulas  were  scattered  about- both 
on  the  mantelpiece  and  on  the  central  table  on 
either  side  of  the  sloping  desk.  On  the  same  table, 
to  the  right,  stood  copies  of  the  five  books  which 
Dr.  Horace  Selby  had  written  upon  the  subject 
with  which  his  name  is  peculiarly  associated, 
while  on  the  left,  on  the  top  of  a  red  medical 
directory,  lay  a  huge  glass  model  of  a  human  eye 
the  size  of  a  turnip,  which  opened  down  the  centre 
to  expose  the  lens  and  double  chamber  within. 

Sir  Francis  Norton  had  never  been  remarkable 
for  his  powers  of  observation,  and  yet  he  found 
himself  watching  these  trifles  with  the  keenest  at- 
tention. Even  the  corrosion  of  the  cork  of  an 
acid  bottle  caught  his  eye,  and  he  wondered  that 
the  doctor  did  not  use  glass  stoppers.  Tiny 
scratches  where  the  light  glinted  off  from  the 
table,  little  stains  upon  the  leather  of  the  desk, 
chemical  formulae  scribbled  upon  the  labels  of 
the  phials— nothing  was  too  slight  to  arrest  his 
attention.  And  his  sense  of  hearing  was  equally 
alert.  The  heavy  ticking  of  the  solemn  black 
clock  above  the  mantelpiece  struck  quite  pain- 
fully upon  his  ears.  Yet  in  spite  of  it,  and  in 
spite  also  of  the  thick,  old-fashioned  wooden  par- 
tition, he  could  hear  voices  of  men  talking  in  the 
next  room,  and  could  even  catch  scraps  of  their 
conversation.  "Second  hand  was  bound  to  take 
it."    "  Why,  you  drew  the  last  of  them  yourself !  " 


k 


THE  THIRD  GExVERATION.  47 

"  How  could  I  play  the  queen  when  I  knew  that 
the  ace  was  against  me  ? "  The  phrases  came  in 
little  spurts  falling  back  into  the  dull  murmur  of 
conversation.  And  then  suddenly  he  heard  the 
creaking  of  a  door  and  a  step  in  the  hall,  and 
knew  with  a  tingling  mixture  of  impatience  and 
horror  that  the  crisis  of  his  life  was  at  hand. 

Dr.  Horace  Selby  was  a  large,  portly  man  with 
an  imposing  presence.  His  nose  and  chin  were 
bold  and  pronounced,  yet  his  features  were  puffy, 
a  combination  which  would  blend  more  freely 
with  the  wig  and  cravat  of  the  early  Georges  than 
with  the  close-cropped  hair  and  black  frock-coat 
of  the  end  of  the  nineteenth  century.  He  was 
clean  shaven,  for  his  mouth  was  too  good  to  cover- 
large,  flexible,  and  sensitive,  with  a  kindly  human 
softening  at  either  comer  which  with  his  brown 
sympathetic  eyes  had  drawn  out  many  a  shame- 
struck  sinner's  secret.  Two  masterful  little  bushy 
side-whiskers  bristled  out  from  under  his  ears 
spindling  away  upwards  to  merge  in  the  thick 
curves  of  his  brindled  hair.  To  his  patients  there 
was  something  reassuring  in  the  mere  bulk  and 
dignity  of  the  man.  A  high  and  easy  bearing  in 
medicine  as  in  war  bears  with  it  a  hint  of  vic- 
tories in  the  past,  and  a  promise  of  others  to  come. 
Dr.  Horace  Selby's  face  was  a  consolation,  and  so 
too  were  the  large,  white,  soothing  hands,  one  of 
which  he  held  out  to  his  visitor. 


48  ROUXD   THE   RED  LAMP. 

"  I  am  sorry  to  have  kept  you  waiting.  It  is  a 
conflict  of  duties,  you  perceive — a  host's  to  his 
guests  and  an  adviser's  to  his  patient.  But  now  I 
am  entirely  at  your  disposal,  Sir  Francis.  But 
dear  me,  you  are  very  cold." 

"Yes,  I  am  cold." 

"And  you  are  trembling  all  over.  Tut,  tut, 
this  will  never  do  !  This  miserable  night  has 
chilled  you.     Perhaps  some  little  stimulant " 

"  No,  thank  you.  I  would  really  rather  not. 
And  it  is  not  the  night  which  has  chilled  me.  I 
am  frightened,  doctor." 

The  doctor  half-turned  in  his  chair,  and  he 
patted  the  arch  of  the  young  man's  knee,  as  he 
might  the  neck  of  a  restless  horse. 

"What  then?"  he  asked,  looldng  over  his 
shoulder  at  the  pale  face  with  the  startled  eyes. 

Twice  the  young  man  parted  his  lips.  Then 
he  stooped  with  a  sudden  gesture,  and  turning 
up  the  right  leg  of  his  trousers  he  pulled  down 
his  sock  and  thrust  forward  his  shin.  The  doc- 
tor made  a  clicking  noise  with  his  tongue  as  he 
glanced  at  it. 

"Both  legs?" 

"No,  only  one." 

"Suddenly?" 

"This  morning." 

"Hum." 

The  doctor  pouted  his  lips,  and  drew  his  finger 


THE   THIRD   GENERATION.  49 

and  thumb  down  tlie  line  of  his  chin.  "Can  you 
account  for  it  ?  "  he  asked  briskly. 

"No." 

A  trace  of  sternness  carae  into  the  large  brown 
eyes. 

"I  need  not  point  out  to  you  that  unless  the 
most  absolute  frankness " 

The  patient  sprang  from  his  chair.  "  So  help 
me  God!"  he  cried,  "I  have  nothing  in  my  life 
with  which  to  reproach  myself.  Do  you  think 
that  I  would  be  such  a  fool  as  to  come  here  and 
tell  you  lies.  Once  for  all,  I  have  nothing  to  re- 
gret." He  was  a  pitiful,  half-tragic  and  half-gro- 
tesque figure,  as  he  stood  with  one  trouser  leg 
rolled  to  the  knee,  and  that  ever  present  horror 
still  lurking  in  his  eyes.  A  burst  of  merriment 
came  from  the  card-players  in  the  next  room,  and 
the  two  looked  at  each  other  in  silence. 

"Sit  down,"  said  the  doctor  abruptly  ;  "your 
assurance  is  quite  sufficient."  He  stooped  and  ran 
his  finger  down  the  line  of  the  young  man's  shin, 
raising  it  at  one  point.  "Hum,  serpiginous,"  he 
murmured,  shaking  his  head.  "Any  other  symp- 
toms ? " 

"  My  eyes  have  been  a  little  weak." 

"  Let  me  see  your  teeth."  He  glanced  at  them, 
and  again  made  the  gentle,  clicking  sound  of  sym- 
pathy and  disapprobation. 

"  Now  your  eye."    He  lit  a  lamp  at  the  pa- 


50  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

tient's  elbow,  and  holding  a  small  crystal  lens 
to  concentrate  the  light,  he  threw  it  obliquely 
upon  the  patient's  eye.  As  he  did  so  a  glow  of 
pleasure  came  over  his  large  expressive  face,  a 
flush  of  such  enthusiasm  as  the  botanist  feels 
when  he  packs  the  rare  plant  into  his  tin  knap- 
sack, or  the  astronomer  when  the  long-sought 
comet  first  swims  into  the  field  of  his  telescope. 

"This  is  very  typical— very  typical  indeed," 
he  murmured,  turning  to  his  desk  and  jotting 
down  a  few  memoranda  upon  a  sheet  of  paper. 
"  Curiously  enough,  I  am  writing  a  monograph 
upon  the  subject.  It  is  singular  that  you  should 
have  been  able  to  furnish  so  well-marked  a  case." 
He  had  so  forgotten  the  patient  in  his  symptom, 
that  he  had  assumed  an  almost  congratulatory  air 
towards  its  possessor.  He  reverted  to  human 
sympathy  again,  as  his  patient  asked  for  particu- 
lars, 

"My  dear  sir,  there  is  no  occasion  for  us  to  go 
into  strictly  professional  details  together,"  said 
he  soothingly.  "  If,  for  example,  I  were  to  say  that 
you  have  interstitial  keratitis,  how  would  you  be 
the  wiser?  There  are  indications  of  a  strumous 
diathesis.  In  broad  terms,  I  may  say  that  you 
have  a  constitutional  and  hereditary  taint." 

The  young  baronet  sank  back  in  his  chair,  and 
his  chin  fell  forwards  upon  his  chest.  The  doctor 
sprang  to  a  side-table  and  poured  out  half  a  glass 


THE  THIRD  GENERATION.  51 

of  liqueur  brandy  which  he  held  to  his  patient's 
lips.  A  little  fleck  of  colour  came  into  his  cheeks 
as  he  drank  it  down. 

"Perhaps  I  spoke  a  little  abruptly,"  said  the 
doctor,  "but  you  must  have  known  the  nature  of 
your  complaint.  Why,  otherwise,  should  you 
have  come  to  me  ? " 

"  God  help  me,  I  suspected  it ;  but  only  to- 
day when  my  leg  grew  bad.  My  father  had  a  leg 
like  this." 

"  It  was  from  him,  then ? " 

"No,  from  my  grandfather.  You  have  heard 
of  Sir  Eupert  Norton,  the  great  Corinthian  ? " 

The  doctor  was  a  man  of  wide  reading  with  a 
retentive  memory.  The  name  brought  back  in- 
stantly to  him  the  remembrance  of  the  sinister 
reputation  of  its  owner — a  notorious  buck  of  the 
thirties  —  who  had  gambled  and  duelled  and 
steeped  himself  in  drink  and  debauchery,  until 
even  the  vile  set  with  whom  he  consorted  had 
shrunk  away  from  him  in  horror,  and  left  him  to 
a  sinister  old  age  with  the  barmaid  wife  whom  he 
had  married  in  some  drunken  frolic.  As  he 
looked  at  the  young  man  still  leaning  back  in 
the  leather  chair,  there  seemed  for  the  instant  to 
flicker  up  behind  him  some  vague  presentiment  of 
that  foul  old  dandy  with  his  dangling  seals,  many- 
wreathed  scarf,  and  dark  satyric  face.  What  was 
he  now  1    An  armful  of  bones  in  a  mouldy  box. 


52  ROUXD   THE   RED   LAMP. 

But  his  deeds — they  were  living  and  rotting  the 
blood  in  the  veins  of  an  innocent  man. 

"I  see  that  you  have  heard  of  him,"  said  the 
young  baronet.  "He  died  horribly,  I  have  been 
told ;  but  not  more  horribly  than  he  had  lived. 
My  father  was  his  only  son.  He  was  a  studions 
man,  fond  of  books  and  canaries  and  the  country  ; 
but  his  innocent  life  did  not  save  him." 

"His  symptoms  were  cutaneous,  I  under- 
stand." 

"He  wore  gloves  in  the  house.  That  was  the 
first  thing  I  can  remember.  And  then  it  was  his 
throat.  And  then  his  legs.  He  used  to  ask  me  so 
often  about  my  own  health,  and  I  thought  him  so 
fussy,  for  how  could  I  tell  what  the  meaning  of  it 
was.  He  was  always  watching  me — always  with 
a  sidelong  eye  fixed  upon  me.  Now,  at  last,  I 
know  what  he  was  watching  for." 

"  Had  you  brothers  or  sisters  ? " 

"None,  thank  God." 

"Well,  well,  it  is  a  sad  case,  and  very  typical 
of  many  which  come  in  my  way.  You  are  no 
lonely  sufferer,  Sir  Francis.  There  are  many 
thousands  who  bear  the  same  cross  as  you  do." 

"But  where  is  the  justice  of  it,  doctor?"  cried 
the  young  man,  springing  from  his  chair  and  pac- 
ing up  and  down  the  consulting- room.  "If  I 
were  heir  to  my  grandfather's  sins  as  well  as  to 
their  results,  I  could  understand  it,  but  I  am  of 


THE  THIRD   GENERATION.  53 

my  father's  type.  I  love  all  that  is  gentle  and 
beautiful— music  and  poetry  and  art.  The  coarse 
and  animal  is  abhorrent  to  me.  Ask  any  of  my 
friends  and  they  would  tell  you  that.  And  now 
that  this  vile,  loathsome  thing — ach,  I  am  pol- 
luted to  the  marrow,  soaked  in  abomination ! 
And  why  ?  Haven't  I  a  right  to  ask  why  ?  Did  I 
do  it  ?  Was  it  my  fault  ?  Could  I  help  being 
born  ?  And  look  at  me  now,  blighted  and  blasted, 
just  as  life  was  at  its  sweetest.  Talk  about  the 
sins  of  the  father — how  about  the  sins  of  the  Cre- 
ator?" He  shook  his  two  clinched  hands  in  the 
air — the  poor  impotent  atom  with  his  pin-point  of 
brain  caught  in  the  whirl  of  the  infinite. 

The  doctor  rose  and  placing  his  hands  upon 
his  shoulders  he  pressed  him  back  into  his  chair 
once  more.  "  There,  there,  my  dear  lad,"  said  he ; 
"you  must  not  excite  yourself.  You  are  trem- 
bling all  over.  Your  nerves  cannot  stand  it.  We 
must  take  these  great  questions  upon  trust.  What 
are  we,  after  all  ?  Half-evolved  creatures  in  a  tran- 
sition stage,  nearer  perhaps  to  the  Medusa  on  the 
one  side  than  to  perfected  humanity  on  the  other. 
With  half  a  complete  brain  we  can't  expect  to 
understand  the  whole  of  a  complete  fact,  can  we, 
now  ?  It  is  all  very  dim  and  dark,  no  doubt ; 
but  I  think  that  Pope's  famous  couplet  sums  up 
the  whole  matter,  and  from  my  heart,  after  fifty 
Y«vars  of  varied  experience,  I  can  say " 


54  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

But  the  young  baronet  gave  a  cry  of  impatience 
and  disgust.  "Words,  words,  words!  You  can 
sit  comfortably  there  in  your  chair  and  say  them — 
and  think  them  too,  no  doubt.  You'  ve  had  your 
life,  but  I've  never  had  mine.  YouVe  healthy 
blood  in  your  veins ;  mine  is  putrid.  And  yet  I 
am  as  innocent  as  you.  What  would  words  do  for 
you  if  you  were  in  this  chair  and  I  in  that  ?  Ah, 
it's  such  a  mockery  and  a  make-believe !  Don't 
think  me  rude,  though,  doctor.  I  don't  mean  to  be 
that.  I  only  say  that  it  is  impossible  for  you  or 
any  other  man  to  realise  it.  But  I've  a  question 
to  ask  you,  doctor.  It's  one  on  which  my  whole 
life  must  depend."  He  writhed  his  fingers  to- 
gether in  an  agony  of  apprehension. 

"Speak  out,  my  dear  sir.  I  have  every  sym- 
pathy with  you." 

"Do  you  think — do  you  think  the  poison  has 
spent  itself  on  me  ?  Do  you  think  that  if  I  had 
children  they  would  suffer  ? " 

"I  can  only  give  one  answer  to  that.  'The 
third  and  fourth  generation,'  says  the  trite  old 
text.  You  may  in  time  eliminate  it  from  your 
system,  but  many  years  must  pass  before  you  can 
think  of  marriage." 

"I  am  to  be  married  on  Tuesday,"  whispered 
the  patient. 

It  was  the  doctor's  turn  to  be  thrilled  with 
horror.     There  were  not  many  situations  which 


THE  THIRD  GENERATION.  55 

would  yield  such  a  sensation  to  his  seasoned 
nerves.  He  sat  in  silence  while  the  babble  of  the 
card-table  broke  in  upon  them  again.  "  We  had 
a  double  ruff  if  you  had  returned  a  heart."  "I 
was  bound  to  clear  the  trumps."  They  were  hot 
and  angry  about  it. 

"  How  could  you  ?  "  cried  the  doctor  severely. 
"  It  was  criminal." 

"You  forget  that  I  have  only  learned  howl 
stand  to-day."  He  put  his  two  hands  to  his 
temples  and  pressed  them  convulsively.  "  You 
are  a  man  of  the  world,  Dr.  Selby.  You  have 
seen  or  heard  of  such  things  before.  Give  me 
some  advice.  I'm  in  your  hands.  It  is  all  very 
sudden  and  horrible,  and  I  don't  think  I  am  strong 
enough  to  bear  it." 

The  doctor's  heavy  brows  thickened  into  two 
straight  lines,  and  he  bit  his  nails  in  perplexity. 

"  The  marriage  must  not  take  place." 

' '  Then  what  am  I  to  do  ?  " 

"  At  all  costs  it  must  not  take  place." 

"  And  I  must  give  her  up  1 " 

"  There  can  be  no  question  about  that." 

The  young  man  took  out  a  pocketbook  and 
drew  from  it  a  small  photograph,  holding  it  out 
towards  the  doctor.  The  firm  face  softened  as  he 
looked  at  it. 

"It  is  very  hard  on  you,  no  doubt.  I  can  ap- 
preciate it  more  now  that  I  have  seen  that.    But 


56  ROUND   THE   RED   LAMP. 

there  is  no  alternative  at  all.  You  must  ^ive  up 
all  thought  of  it." 

"But  this  is  madness,  doctor — madness,  I  tell 
you.  No,  I  won't  raise  my  voice.  I  forgot  my- 
self. But  realise  it,  man.  I  am  to  be  married  on 
Tuesday.  This  coming  Tuesday,  you  understand. 
And  all  the  world  knows  it.  How  can  I  put  such  a 
public  affront  upon  her.     It  would  be  monstrous." 

"  None  the  less  it  must  be  done.  My  dear  lad, 
there  is  no  way  out  of  it." 

"You  would  have  me  simply  write  brutally 
and  break  the  engagement  at  the  last  moment 
without  a  reason.     I  tell  you  I  couldn't  do  it." 

"  I  had  a  patient  once  who  found  himself  in  a 
somewhat  similar  situation  some  years  ago,"  said 
the  doctor  thoughtfully.  "His  device  was  a  sin- 
gular one.  He  deliberately  committed  a  penal 
offence,  and  so  compelled  the  young  lady' s  people 
to  withdraw  their  consent  to  the  marriage." 

The  young  baronet  shook  his  head.  "  My  per- 
sonal honour  is  as  yet  unstained,"  said  he.  "I 
have  little  else  left,  but  that,  at  least,  I  will  pre- 
serve." 

"Well,  well,  it  is  a  nice  dilemma,  and  the 
choice  lies  with  you." 

"  Have  you  no  other  suggestion  ?  " 

"You  don't  happen  to  have  property  in 
Australia  ? " 

"None." 


THE  THIRD   GENERATION.  57 

,  "But  you  have  capital  ? " 

"Yes." 

"Then  you  could  buy  some.  To-morrow  morn- 
ing would  do.  A  thousand  mining  shares  would 
be  enough.  Then  you  might  write  to  say  that 
urgent  business  affairs  have  compelled  you  to 
start  at  an  hour's  notice  to  inspect  your  property. 
That  would  give  you  six  months,  at  any  rate." 

"  Well,  that  would  be  possible.  Yes,  certainly, 
it  would  be  possible.  But  think  of  her  position. 
The  house  full  of  wedding  presents— guests  com- 
ing from  a  distance.  It  is  awful.  And  you  say 
that  there  is  no  alternative." 

The  doctor  shrugged  his  shoulders. 

"  Well,  then,  I  might  write  it  now,  and  start 
to-morrow— eh  ?  Perhaps  you  would  let  me  use 
your  desk.  Thank  you.  I  am  so  sorry  to  keep 
you  from  your  guests  so  long.  But  I  won't  be  a 
moment  now." 

He  wrote  an  abrupt  note  of  a  few  lines.  Then 
with  a  sudden  impulse  he  tore  it  to  shreds  and 
flung  it  into  the  fireplace. 

"  No,  I  can't  sit  down  and  tell  her  a  lie,  doctor," 
he  said  rising.  "We  must  find  some  other  way 
out  of  this.  I  will  think  it  over  and  let  you  know 
my  decision.  You  must  allow  me  to  double  your 
fee  as  I  have  taken  such  an  unconscionable  time. 
Now  good-bye,  and  thank  you  a  thousand  times 

for  your  sympathy  and  advice." 

5 


58  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

"Why,  dear  me,  you  haven't  even  got.  your 
prescription  yet.  This  is  the  mixture,  and  I 
should  recommend  one  of  these  powders  every 
morning,  and  the  chemist  will  put  all  directions 
upon  the  ointment  box.  You  are  placed  in  a 
cruel  situation,  but  I  trust  that  these  may  be  but 
passing  clouds.  When  may  I  hope  to  hear  from 
you  again  ? " 

"  To-morrow  morning." 

"Very  good.  How  the  rain  is  splashing  in 
the  street !  You  have  your  waterproof  there. 
You  will  need  it.  Good-bye,  then,  until  to- 
morrow." 

He  opened  the  door.  A  gust  of  cold,  damp 
air  swept  into  the  hall.  And  yet  the  doctor 
stood  for  a  minute  or  more  watching  the  lonely 
figure  which  passed  slowly  through  the  yellow 
splotches  of  the  gas  lamps,  and  into  the  broad 
bars  of  darkness  between.  It  was  but  his  own 
shadow  which  trailed  up  the  wall  as  he  passed 
the  lights,  and  yet  it  looked  to  the  doctor's  eye 
as  though  some  huge  and  sombre  figure  walked 
by  a  manikin's  side  and  led  him  silently  up  the 
lonely  street. 

Dr.  Horace  Selby  heard  again  of  his  patient 
next  morning,  and  rather  earlier  than  he  had  ex- 
pected. A  paragraph  in  the  Daily  News  caused 
him  to  push  away  his  breakfast  untasted,  and 
turned  him  sick  and  faint  while  he  read  it.     "A 


THE  THIRD   GENERATION.  59 

Deplorable  Accident,"  it  was  headed,  and  it  ran 
in  this  way  : 

"A  fatal  accident  of  a  peculiarly  painful 
character  is  reported  from  King  William  Street. 
About  eleven  o'clock  last  night  a  young  man  was 
observed  while  endeavouring  to  get  out  of  the  way 
of  a  hansom  to  slip  and  fall  under  the  wheels  of  a 
heavy,  two- horse  dray.  On  being  picked  up  his 
injuries  were  found  to  be  of  the  most  shocking 
character,  and  he  expired  while  being  conveyed  to 
the  hospital.  An  examination  of  his  pocketbook 
and  cardcase  shows  beyond  any  question  that  the 
deceased  is  none  other  than  Sir  Francis  Norton, 
of  Deane  Park,  who  has  only  within  the  last 
year  come  into  the  baronetcy.  The  accident  is 
made  the  more  deplorable  as  the  deceased,  who 
was  only  just  of  age,  was  on  the  eve  of  being  mar- 
ried to  a  young  lady  belonging  to  one  of  the 
oldest  families  in  the  South.  With  his  wealth 
and  his  talents  the  ball  of  fortune  was  at  his  feet, 
and  his  many  friends  will  be  deeply  grieved  to 
know  that  his  promising  career  has  been  cut  short 
in  so  sudden  and  tragic  a  fashion." 


A  FALSE   START. 

"Is  Dr.  Horace  Wilkinson  at  liorae?" 

"J  am  he.     Pray  step  in." 

The  visitor  looked  somewhat  astonished  at 
having  the  door  opened  to  him  by  the  master  of 
the  house. 

"Ijyanted  to  have  a  few  words." 

The  doctor,  a  pale,  nervous  young  man,  dressed 
in  an  ultra-professional,  long  black  frock-coat,  with 
a  high,  white  collar  cutting  off  his  dapper  side- 
whiskers  in  the  centre,  rubbed  his  hands  together 
and  smiled.  I^  the  thick,  burly  man  in  front  of 
him  he  scented  a  patient,  and  it  would  be  his 
first.  His  scanty  resources  had  begun  to  run 
somewhat  low,  and,  although  he  had  his  first 
quarter's  rent  safely  locked  away  in  the  right- 
hand  drawer  of  his  desk,  it  was  becoming  a  ques- 
tion with  him  how  he  should  meet  the  current 
expenses  of  his  very  simple  housekeeping.  He 
bowed,  therefore,  waved  his  visitor  in,  closed  the 
hall  door  in  a  careless  fashion,  as  though  his  own 
presence  thereat  had  been  a  purely  accidental  cir- 


A  FALSE  START.  61 

cumstance,  and  finally  led  the  burly  stranger  into 
his  scantily  furnished  front  room,  where  he  mo- 
tioned him  to  a  seat.  Dr._Wi]kinson  planted  him- 
self behind  his  desk,  and,  placing  his  finger-tips 
together,  he  gazed  with  some  apprehension  at  his 
companion.  What  was  the  matter  with  the  man  ? 
Hejseemed  very  red  in  the  face.  _Some  of  his  old 
professors  would  have  diagnosed  his  case  by  now, 
and  would  have  electrified  the  patient  by  describ- 
ing his  own  symptoms  before  he  had  said  a  word 
about  them.  Dr.  Horace  Wilkinson  racked  his 
brains  for  some  clue,  but  Nature  had  fashioned 
him  as  a  plodder — a  very  reliable  plodder  and 
nothing  more.  He  could  think  of  nothing  save 
that  the  visitor's  watch-chain  had  a  very  brassy 
appearance,  with  a  corollary  to  the  effect  that  he 
would  be  lucky  if  he  got  half-a-crown  out  of  him. 
Still,  even  half-a-crown  was  something  in  those 
early  days  of  struggle. 

Whilst  the  doctor  had  been  running  his  eyes 
over  the  stranger,  the  latter  had  been  plunging 
his  hands  into  pocket  after  pocket  of  his  heavy 
coat.  The  heat  of  the  weather,  his  dress,  and  this 
exercise  of  pocket-rummaging  had  all  combined 
to  still  further  redden  his  face,  which  had  changed 
from  brick  to  beet,  with  a  gloss  of  moisture  on  his 
brow.  This  extreme  ruddiness  brought  a  clue  at 
last  to  the  observant  doctor.  Surely  it  was  not 
to  be  attained  without  alcohol.     In  alcohol  lay 


62  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

the  secret  of  this  man's  trouble.  Some  little  deli- 
cacy was  needed,  however,  in  showing  him  that 
he  had  read  his  case  aright — that  at  a  glance  he 
had  penetrated  to  the  inmost  sources  of  his  ail- 
ments. 

"  It's  very  hot,"  observed  the  stranger,  mopping 
his  forehead. 

"Yes,  it  is  weather  which  tempts  one  to  drink 
rather  more  beer  than  is  good  for  one,"  answered 
Dr.  Horace  Wilkinson,  looking  very  knowingly 
at  his  companion  from  over  his  finger-tips. 

"Dear,  dear,  you  shouldn't  do  that." 

"IJ     I  never  touch  beer." 

"Neither  do  I.  I've  been  an  abstainer  for 
twenty  years." 

/  This  was  depressing.  Dr.  Wilkinson  blushed 
until  he  was  nearly  as  red  as  the  other.  "May  I 
ask  what  I  can  do  for  you?"  he  asked,  picking 
up  his  stethoscope  and  tapping  it  gently  against 
his  thumb-nail. 

"  Yes,  I  was  just  going  to  tell  you.     I  heard  of 

your  coming,  but  I  couldn't  get  round  before " 

He  broke  into  a  nervous  little  cough. 
'  "Yes?"  said  the  doctor  encouragingly. 

"I  should  have  been  here  three  weeks  ago,  but 
you  know  how  these  things  get  put  off."  He 
coughed  again  behind  his  large  red  hand. 

"I  do  not  think  that  you  need  say  anything 
more,"  said  the  doctor,  taking  over  the  case  with 


A  FALSE  START.  63 

an  easy  air  of  command.  "  Yqur  cough  is  quite 
sufficient.  Itjs  entirely  bronchial  by  the  sound. 
Nojioubt  the  mischief  is  circumscribed  at  present, 
but  there  is  always  the  danger  that  it  may  spread, 
so  you  have  done  wisely  to  come  to  me.  A  little 
judicious  treatment  will  soon  set  you  right.  Your 
waistcoat,  please,  but  not  your  shirt  J  Puff  out 
your  chest  and  say  ninety-nine  in  a  deep  voice." 

The  red-faced  man  began  to  laugh.  "It's  all 
right,  doctor,"  said  he.  "  That  cough  comes  from 
chewing  tobacco,  and  I  know  it's  a  very  bad 
habit.  Nine-and-ninepence  is  what  I  have  to  say 
to  you,  for  I'm  the  officer  of  the  gas  company,  and 
they  have  a  claim  against  you  for  that  on  the 
metre." 

Dr.  Horace  Wilkinson  collapsed  into  his  chair. 
"  Xhen  you're  not  a  patient  ? "  he  gasped. 

'^ever  needed  a  doctor  in  my  life,  sir." 

"Qh,  that's  all  right."  The  doctor  concealed 
his  disappointment  under  an  affectation  of  face- 
tiousness.  "You  don't  look  as  if  you  troubled 
them  much.  I  don't  know  what  we  should  do  if 
every  one  were  as  robust.  I  shall  call  at  the  com- 
pany's offices  and  pay  this  small  amount." 

"Jf  you  could  make  it  convenient,  sir,  now 
that  I  am  here,  it  would  save  trouble " 

"  Oh,  certainly  !  "  These  eternal  little  sordid 
money  troubles  were  more  trying  to  the  doctor 
than  plain  living  or  scanty  food.    He  took  out  his 


64  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

purse  and  slid  the  contents  on  to  the  table.  There 
were  two  half-crowns  and  some  pennies.  In  his 
drawer  he  had  ten  golden  sovereigns.  But  those 
were  his  rent.  If  he  once  broke  in  uj^on  them  he 
was  lost.     He  would  starve  first. 

"Dear  me  !  "  said  he,  with  a  smile,  as  at  some 
strange,  unheard-of  incident.  "I  have  run  short 
of  small  change.  I  am  afraid  I  shall  have  to  call 
upon  the  company,  after  all." 

"Very  well,  sir."  The  inspector  rose,  and 
with  a  practised  glance  around,  w^hich  valued 
every  article  in  the  room,  from  the  two-guinea 
carpet  to  the  eight- shilling  muslin  curtains,  he 
took  his  departure. 

When  he  had  gone  Dr.  Wilkinson  rearranged 
his  room,  as  was  his  habit  a  dozen  times  in  the 
day.  Hejaid  out  his  large  Quain's  Dictionary  of 
Medicine  in  the  forefront  of  the  table  so  as  to 
impress  the  casual  patient  that  he  had  ever  the 
best  authorities  at  his  elbow/  Then  he  cleared 
all  the  little  instruments  out  of  his  pocket-case — 
the  scissors,  the  forceps,  the  bistouries,  the  lancets 
—and  he  laid  them  all  out  beside  the  stethoscope, 
to  make  as  good  a  show  as  possible.  His  ledger, 
day-book,  and  visiting-book  were  spread  in  front 
of  him.  There  was  no  entry  in  any  of  them  j^et, 
but  it  would  not  look  well  to  have  the  covers  too 
glossy  and  new,  so  he  rubbed  them  together  and 
daubed  ink  over  them.    Neither  would  it  be  well 


A  FALSE  START.  65 

that  any  patient  should  observe  that  his  name  was 
the  first  in  the  book,  so  he  filled  up  the  first  page 
of  each  with  notes  of  imaginary  visits  paid  to 
nameless  patients  during  the  last  three  weeks. 
Having  done  all  this,  he  rested  his  head  upon  his 
hands  and  relapsed  into  the  terrible  occupation 
of  waiting.  \ 

Terrible  enough  at  any  time  to  the  young  i)ro- 
fessional  man,  but  most  of  all  to  one  who  knows 
that  the  weeks,  and  even  the  days  during  which 
he  can  hold  out  are  numbered.  Economise  as  he 
would,  the  money  would  still  slip  away  in  the 
countless  little  claims  which  a  man  never  under- 
stands until  he  lives  under  a  roof  tree  of  his  own. 
Dr.  Wilkinson  could  not  deny,  as  he  sat  at  his 
desk  and  looked  at  the  little  heap  of  silver  and 
coppers,  that  his  chances  of  being  a  successful 
practitioner  in  Sutton  were  rapidly  vanishing 
away. 

And  yet  it  was  a  bustling,  prosperous  town, 
with  so  much  money  in  it  that  it  seemed  strange 
that  a  man  with  a  trained  brain  and  dexterous 
fingers  should  be  starved  out  of  it  for  want  of  em- 
ployment. At  his  desk,  Dr.  Horace  Wilkinson 
could  see  the  never-ending  double  current  of  peo- 
ple which  ebbed  and  flowed  in  front  of  his  win- 
dow. It  was  a  busy  street,  and  the  air  was  for- 
ever filled  with  the  dull  roar  of  life,  the  grinding 
of  the  wheels,  and  the  patter  of  countless  feet. 


66  ROUND  THE   RED   LAMP. 

Men,  women,  and  children,  thousands  and.  thou- 
sands of  them  passed  in  the  day,  and  yet  each 
was  hurrying  on  upon  his  own  business,  scarce 
glancing  at  the  small  brass  plate,  or  wasting  a 
thought  upon  the  man  who  waited  in  the  front 
room.  And  yet  how  many  of  them  would  obvi- 
ously, glaringly  have  been  the  better  for  his  profes- 
sional assistance.  Dyspeptic  men,  anaemic  women, 
blotched  faces,  bilious  complexions — they  flowed 
past  him,  they  needing  him,  he  needing  them,  and 
yet  the  remorseless  bar  of  professional  etiquette 
kept  them  forever  apart.  What  could  he  do  ? 
Could  he  stand  at  his  own  front  door,  pluck  the 
casual  stranger  by  the  sleeve,  and  whisper  in  Ms 
ear,  "  Sir,  you  will  forgive  me  for  remarking  that 
you  are  suffering  from  a  severe  attack  of  acne 
rosacea,  which  makes  you  a  peculiarly  unpleasant 
object.  Allow  me  to  suggest  that  a  small  pre- 
scription containing  arsenic,  which  will  not  cost 
you  more  than  you  often  spend  upon  a  single 
meal,  will  be  very  much  to  your  advantage." 
Such  an  address  would  be  a  degradation  to  the 
high  and  lofty  profession  of  Medicine,  and  there 
are  no  such  sticklers  for  the  ethics  of  that  pro- 
fession as  some  to  whom  she  has  been  but  a  bitter 
and  a  grudging  mother. 

V,  •  Dr.  Horace  Wilkinson  was  still  looking  moodily 
out  of  the  window,  when  there  came  a  sharp  clang 
at  the  bell.     Often  it  had  rung,  and  with  every 


A  FALSE  START.  67 

ring  his  hopes  had  sprung  up,  only  to  dwindle 
away  again,  and  change  to  leaden  disappointment, 
as  he  faced  some  beggar  or  touting  tradesman. 
But  the  doctor's  spirit  was  young  and  elastic,  and 
again,  in  spite  of  all  experience,  it  responded  to 
that  exhilarating  summons.  He  sprang  to  his 
feet,  cast  his  eyes  over  the  table,  thrust  out  his 
medical  books  a  little  more  prominently,  and  hur- 
ried to  the  door.  '•  A  groan  escaped  him  as  he  en- 
tered the  hall.  He  could  see  through  the  half- 
glazed  upper  panels  that  a  gypsy  van,  hung  round 
with  wicker  tables  and  chairs,  had  halted  before 
his  door,  and  that  a  couple  of  the  vagrants,  with 
a  baby,  were  waiting  outside.  He  had  learned 
by  experience  that  it  was  better  not  evfen  to  parley 
with  such  people. 

''I  have  nothing  for  you,"  said  he,  loosing  the 
latch  by  an  inch.     "  Go  away  !  " 

He^closed  the  door,  but  the  bell  clanged  once 
more.  "Get  away!  Get  away!"  he  cried  im- 
patiently, and  walked  back  into  his  consulting- 
room.  He  had  hardly  seated  himself  when  the 
bell  went  for  the  third  time.  In  a  towering 
passion  he  rushed  back.  Hung  open  the  door. 
"What  the 1" 

"  If  you  please,  sir,  we  need  a  doctor." 

In  an  instant  he  was  rubbing  his  hands  again 
with  his  blandest  professional  smile.  These  were 
patients,  then,  whom  he  had  tried  to  hunt  from 


68  ROUND   THE  RED   LAMP. 

Ms  doorstep — the  very  first  patients,  whom  he 
had  waited  for  so  impatiently.  They  did  not 
look  very  promising.  The  man,  a  tall,  lank- 
haired  gypsy,  had  gone  back  to  the  horse's  head. 
There  remained  a  small,  hard-faced  woman  with  a 
great  bruise  all  round  her  eye.  She  wore  a  yellow 
silk  handkerchief  round  her  head,  and  a  baby, 
tucked  in  a  red  shawl,  was  pressed  to  her  bosom. 

"Pr^y  step  in,  madam,"  said  Dr.  Horace 
Wilkinson,  with  his  very  best  sympathetic  man- 
ner. In  this  case,  at  least,  there  could  be  no  mis- 
take as  to  diagnosis.  "  If^'ou  will  sit  on  this  sofa, 
I  shall  very  soon  make  you  feel  much  more  com- 
fortable." 

He  poured  a  little  water  from  his  carafe  into 
a  saucer,  made  a  compress  of  lint,  fastened  it  over 
the  injured  eye,  and  secured  the  whole  with  a 
silica  bandage,  secundum  artem. 

"  Thajik  ye  kindly,  sir,"  said  the  woman,  when 
his  work  was  finished  ;  "  that's  nice  and  warm,  and 
may  God  bless  your  honour.  But  it  wasn't  about 
my  eye  at  all  that  I  came  to  see  a  doctor." 

"!N'ot  your  eye?  "  Dr.  Horace  Wilkinson  was 
beginning  to  be  a  little  doubtful  as  to  the  ad- 
vantages of  quick  diagnosis.  It  is  an  excellent 
thing  to  be  able  to  surprise  a  patient,  but  hith- 
erto it  was  always  the  patient  who  had  surprised 
him. 

"  The  baby's  got  the  measles." 


A  FALSE  START.  69 

The  motlier  parted  the  red  shawl,  and  exhibited 
a  little  dark,  black-eyed  gypsy  baby,  whose 
swarthy  face  was  all  flushed  and  mottled  with  a 
dark-red  rash.  The  child  breathed  with  a  rattling 
sound,  and  it  looked  up  at  the  doctor  with  eyes 
which  were  heavy  with  want  of  sleep  and  crusted 
together  at  the  lids. 

"Hum!  Yes.  Measles,  sure  enough— and  a 
smart  attack." 

"I  Just  w^anted  you  to  see  her,  sir,  so  that 
you  could  signify." 

"Could  what?" 

"  Signify,  if  anything  happened," 

"Oh,  I  see — certify," 

"And  now  that  you've  seen  it,  sir,  I'll  go  on, 
for  Reuben — that's  my  man — is  in  a  hurry," 

"  But  don't  you  want  any  medicine  ?" 

"  Ohj_now  you've  seen  it,  it's  all  right.  I'll  let 
you  know  if  anything  happens." 

"  But  you  must  have  some  medicine.  The 
child  is  very  ill."  He  descended  into  the  little 
room  which  he  had  fitted  as  a  surgery,  and  he 
made  up  a  two-ounce  bottle  of  cooling  medicine. 
In  such  cities  as  Sutton  there  are  few  patients  who 
can  afford  to  pay  a  fee  to  both  doctor  and  chemist, 
so  that  unless  the  physician  is  prepared  to  play 
the  part  of  both  he  will  have  little  chance  of  mak- 
ing a  living  at  either. 

"  There  is  your  medicine,  madam.     You  will 


YO  EOUND   THE   RED   LAMP. 

find  the  directions  upon  the  bottle.  Keep  the 
child  warm  and  give  it  a  light  diet." 

"  Tljank  you  kindly,  sir."  She  shouldered  her 
baby  and  marched  for  the  door. 

"Excuse  me,  madam,"  said  the  doctor  nerv- 
ously. "  Don't  you  think  it  too  small  a  matter  to 
make  a  bill  of  ?  Perhaps  it  would  be  better  if  we 
had  a  settlement  at  once." 

The  gypsy  woman  looked  at  him  reproachfully 
out  of  her  one  uncovered  eye. 

"  Ar^  you  going  to  charge  me  for  that?"  she 
asked.     "  How  much,  then  ? " 

"Well,  say  half-a-crown."  He  mentioned  the 
sum  in  a  half -jesting  way,  as  though  it  were  too 
small  to  take  serious  notice  of,  but  the  gypsy 
woman  raised  quite  a  scream  at  the  mention  of  it. 

"  '^f-a-crown  !  for  that  ?  " 

"Well,  my  good  woman,  why  not  go  to  the 
poor  doctor  if  you  cannot  afford  a  fee  ? " 

She  fumbled  in  her  pocket,  craning  awkwardly 
to  keep  her  grip  upon  the  baby. 

' '  Here' s  sevenpence,"  she  said  at  last,  holding 
out  a  little  pile  of  copper  coius.  "I'll  give  you 
that  and  a  wicker  footstool." 

"But  my  fee  is  half-a-crown."  The  doctor's 
views  of  the  glory  of  his  profession  cried  out 
against  this  wretched  haggling,  and  yet  what  was 
he  to  do  1 

"  AVhere  am  I  to  sret  'arf-a-crown  ?    It  is  well 


A   FALSE  START.  71 

for  gentlefolk  like  you  who  sit  in  your  grand 
houses,  and  can  eat  and  drink  what  you  like,  an' 
charge  'arf-a-crown  for  just  saying  as  much  as, 
'  'Ow  d'ye  do  ? '  We  can't  pick  up  'arf-crowns  like 
that.  What  we  gets  we  earns  'ard.  This  seven- 
pence  is  just  all  I've  got.  You  told  me  to  feed 
the  child  light.  She  must  feed  light,  for  what 
she's  to  have  is  more  than  I  know." 

Whilst  the  woman  had  been  speaking.  Dr. 
Horace  Wilkinson's  eyes  had  wandered  to  the 
tiny  heap  of  money  upon  the  table,  which  repre- 
sented all  that  separated  him  from  absolute  star- 
vation, and  he  chuckled  to  himself  at  the  grim 
joke  that  he  should  appear  to  this  poor  woman  to 
be  a  being  living  in  the  lap  of  luxury.  Then  he 
picked  up  the  odd  coppers,  leaving  only  the  two 
half-crowns  upon  the  table. 

"Here  you  are,"  he  said  brusquely.  "Never 
mind  the  fee,  and  take  these  coppers.  They  may 
be*of  some  use  to  you.  Good-bye  !  "  He  bowed 
her  out,  and  closed  the  door  behind  her.  After 
all  she  was  the  thin  edge  of  the  wedge.  These 
wandering  people  have  great  powers  of  recom- 
mendation. All  large  practices  have  been  built 
up  from  such  foundations.  The  hangers-on  to  the 
kitchen  recommend  to  the  kitchen,  they  to  the 
drawing-room,  and  so  it  spreads.  At  least  he 
could  say  now  that  he  had  had  a  patient. 

He  went  into  the  back  room  and  lit  the  spirit- 


72  ROUXD  THE   RED  LAMP. 

kettle  to  boil  tlie  water  for  his  tea,  laughing  the 
while  at  the  recollection  of  his  recent  interview. 
If  all  patients  were  like  this  one  it  conld  easily  be 
reckoned  how  many  it  would  take  to  ruin  him 
completely.  Putting  aside  the  dirt  upon  his 
carpet  and  the  loss  of  time,  there  were  twopence 
gone  upon  the  bandage,  fourpence  or  more  upon 
the  medicine,  to  say  nothing  of  phial,  cork,  label, 
and  paper.  Then  he  had  given  her  fivepence,  so 
that  his  first  patient  had  absorbed  altogether  not 
less  than  one  sixth  of  his  available  capital.  If 
five  more  were  to  come  he  would  be  a  broken  man. 
He  sat  down  upon  the  portmanteau  and  shook 
with  laughter  at  the  thought,  while  he  measured 
out  his  one  spoonful  and  a  half  of  tea  at  one  shil- 
ling eightpence  into  the  brown  earthenware  teapot. 
Suddenly,  however,  the  laugh  faded  from  his  face, 
and  he  cocked  his  ear  towards  the  door,  standing 
listening  with  a  slanting  head  and  a  sidelong  eye. 
There  had  been  a  rasping  of  wheels  against  the 
curb,  the  sound  of  steps  outside,  and  then  a  loud 
peal  at  the  bell.  With  his  teaspoon  in  his  hand 
he  peeped  round  the  corner  and  saw  with  amaze- 
ment that  a  carriage  and  pair  were  waiting  out- 
side, and  that  a  powdered  footman  was  standing 
at  the  door.  The  spoon  tinkled  down  upon  the 
floor,  and  he  stood  gazing  in  bewilderment. 
Then,  pulling  himself  together,  he  threw  open  the 
door. 


A  FALSE  START.  -73 

"Yimng  man,"  said  the  flunky,  "tell  your 
master.  Dr.  Wilkinson,  that  he  is  wanted  just  as 
quick  as  ever  he  can  come  to  Lady  Millbank,  at 
the  Towers.  He  is  to  come  this  very  instant. 
We'd  take  him  with  us,  but  we  have  to  go  back 
to  see  if  Dr.  Mason  is  home  yet.  Just  you  stir 
your  stumps  and  give  him  the  message." 

The  footman  nodded  and  was  off  in  an  instant, 
while  the  coachman  lashed  his  horses  and  the 
carriage  flew  down  the  street. 

Hete  was  a  new  development.  Dr.  Horace 
Wilkinson  stood  at  his  door  and  tried  to  think 
it  all  out.  Layiy  Millbank,  of  the  Towers  !  Peo- 
ple of  wealth  and  position,  no  doubt.  And  a  seri- 
ous case,  or  why  this  haste  and  summoning  of  two 
doctors  ?  But,  then,  why  in  the  name  of  all  that  is 
wonderful  should  he  be  sent  for  ? 

He  was  obscure,  unknown,  without  influence. 
.  There  must  be  some  mistake.  Yes,  that  must  be 
the  true  explanation ;  or  was  it  possible  that  some 
one  was  attempting  a  cruel  hoax  upon  him  ?  At 
any  rate,  it  was  too  positive  a  message  to  be  disre- 
garded. He  must  set  off  at  once  and  settle  the 
matter  one  way  or  the  other. 

But  he  had  one  source  of  information.  At  the 
corner  of  the  street  was  a  small  shop  where  one  of 
the  oldest  inhabitants  dispensed  newspapers  and 
gossip.  He  could  get  information  there  if  any- 
where.     He  put  on    his  well -brushed    top  hat, 


74  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

secreted  instruments  and  bandages  in  all  his  pock- 
ets, and,  without  waiting  for  his  tea  closed  up  his 
establishment  and  started  off  upon  his  adventure. 

The  stationer  at  the  corner  was  a  human  direc- 
tory to  every  one  and  everything  in  Sutton,  so 
that  he  soon  had  all  the  information  which  he 
wanted.  Sir  John  Millbank  was  very  well  known 
in  the  town,  it  seemed.  He  was  a  merchant  prince, 
an  exporter  of  pens,  three  times  mayor,  and  re- 
ported to  be  fully  worth  two  millions  sterling. 

The  Towers  was  his  palatial  seat,  just  outside 
the  city.  His  wife  had  been  an  invalid  for  some 
years,  and  was  growing  worse.  So  far  the  whole 
thing  seemed  to  be  genuine  enough.  By  some 
amazing  chance  these  people  really  had  sent  for 
him. 

And  then  another  doubt  assailed  him,  and  he 
turned  back  into  the  shop. 

"I  am  your  neighbour,  Dr.  Horace  Wilkin- 
son," said  he.  "Is  there  any  other  medical  man 
of  that  name  in  the  town  ? " 

No,  the  stationer  was  quite  positive  that  there 
was  not. 

That  was  final,  then.  A  great  good  fortune 
had  come  in  his  way,  and  he  must  take  prompt 
advantage  of  it.  He  called  a  cab  and  drove  furi- 
ously to  the  Towers,  with  his  brain  in  a  whirl, 
giddy  with  hope  and  delight  at  one  moment,  and 
sickened  with  fears  and  doubts  at  the  next  lest  the 


A   FALSE  START.  ^5 

case  should  in  some  way  be  beyond  his  powers, 
or  lest  he  should  find  at  some  critical  moment  that 
he  was  without  the  instrument  or  appliance  that 
was  needed.  Every  strange  and  oulre  case  of  which 
he  had  ever  heard  or  read  came  back  into  his 
mind,  and  long  before  he  reached  the  Towers  he 
had  worked  himself  into  a  positive  conviction  that 
he  would  be  instantly  required  to  do  a  trephining 
at  the  least. 

The  Towers  was  a  very  large  house,  standing 
back  amid  trees,  at  the  head  of  a  winding  drive. 
As  he  drove  up  the  doctor  sprang  out,  paid  away 
half  his  worldly  assets  as  a  fare,  and  followed  a 
stately  footman  who,  having  taken  his  name,  led 
him  through  the  oak-panelled,  stained-glass  hall, 
gorgeous  with  deers'  heads  and  ancient  armour, 
and  ushered  him  into  a  large  sitting-room  beyond. 
Aver  J  irritable-looking,  acid-faced  man  was  seated 
in  an.  armchair  by  the  fireplace,  while  two  young 
ladies  in  white  were  standing  together  in  the  bow 
window  at  the  further  end. 

"Huljo!  hullo!  hullo!  What's  this— heh  ?" 
cried  the  irritable  man.  "Are  you  Dr.  Wilkin- 
son ?    Eh  ? " 

"Yes,  sir,  I  am  Dr.  Wilkinson." 

"Really,  now.  Ypu  seem  very  young— much 
younger  than  I  expected.  Well,  well,  well, 
Mason's  old,  and  yet  he  don't  seem  to  know 
much  about  it.     I  suppose  we  must  try  the  other 


76  ROUND  THE  RED   LAMP. 

end  now.  Ygn're  the  Wilkinson  who  wrote  some- 
tliing  about  the  lungs  %    Heh  ? " 

Here  was  a  light !  The  only  two  letters  which 
the  doctor  ha^d  ever  written  to  The  Lancet — mod- 
est little  letters  thrust  away  in  a  back  column 
among  the  wrangles  about  medical  ethics  and 
the  inquiries  as  to  how  much  it  took  to  keep  a 
horse  in  the  country — had  been  upon  pulmonary 
disease.  They  had  not  been  wasted,  then.  Some 
eye  had  picked  them  out  and  marked  the  name  of 
the  writer.  Who  could  say  that  work  was  ever 
wasted,  or  that  merit  did  not  promptly  meet  with 
its  reward  ? 

"Yes,  I  have  written  on  the  subject." 

"  Ha  !     Well,  then,  where's  Mason  ? " 

"  I^Jiave  not  the  pleasure  of  his  acquaint- 
ance." 

"No? — that's  queer  too.  He  knows  you  and 
thinks  a  lot  of  your  opinion.  You're  a  stranger 
in  the  town,  are  you  not  ? " 

"Yes,  I  have  only  been  here  a  very  short 
time." 

"That  was  what  Mason  said.  He  didn't  give 
me  the  address.  Said  he  would  call  on  you  and 
bring  you,  but  when  the  wife  got  worse  of  course 
I  inquired  for  you  and  sent  for  you  direct.  I  sent 
for  Mason,  too,  but  he  was  out.  However,  we 
can't  wait  for  him,  so  just  run  away  upstairs  and 
do  what  you  can." 


A   FALSE  START.  77 

"  WelJ,  I  am  placed  in  a  rather  delicate  posi- 
tion," said  Dr.  Horace  Wilkinson,  with  some  hesi- 
tation. "I  am  here,  as  I  understand,  to  meet 
my  colleague.  Dr.  Mason,  in  consultation.  It 
would,  perhaps,  hardly  be  correct  for  me  to  see 
the  patient  in  his  absence.  _  I  think  that  I  would 
rather  wait." 

"Would  you,  by  Jove!  Do  you  think  I'll 
let  my  wife  get  worse  while  the  doctor  is  coolly 
kicking  his  heels  in  the  room  below?  Hd,  sir,  I 
am  a  plain  man,  and  I^tell  you  that  you  will  either 
go  up  or  go  out." 

The  style  of  speech  jarred  upon  the  doctor's 
sense  of  the  fitness  of  things,  but  still  when  a 
man's  wife  is  ill  much  may  be  overlooked.  He 
contented  himself  by  bowing  somewhat  stiffly. 
"  I  shall  go  up,  if  you  insist  upon  it,"  said  he. 

"I  do  insist  upon  it.  And  another  thing,  I 
won't  have  her  thumped  about  aU  over  the  chest, 
or  any  hocus-pocus  of  the  sort.  She  has  bron- 
chitis and  asthma,  and  that's  all.  If  you  can  cure 
it  well  and  good.  But  it  only  weakens  her  to 
have  you  tapping  and  listening,  and  it  does  no 
good  either." 

Personal  disrespect  was  a  thing  that  the  doc- 
tor could  stand  ;  but  the  profession  was  to  him  a 
holy  thing,  and  a  flippant  word  about  it  cut  him 
to  the  quick. 

"  Thank  you,"  said  he,  picking  up  his  hat.    "  I 


78  ROUND   THE   RED   LAMP. 

have  the  honour  to  wish  you  a  very  good  day.  I 
do  not  care  to  undertake  the  responsibility  of  this 
case." 

"Hullo  !  what's  the  matter  now  ?  " 

"It  is  not  my  habit  to  give  opinions  without 
examining  my  patient.  I  wonder  that  you  should 
suggest  such  a  course  to  a  medical  man.  I  wish 
you  good  day." 

But  Sir  John  Millbank  was  a  commercial  man, 
and  believed  in  the  commercial  principle  that  the 
more  difficult  a  thing  is  to  attain  the  more  valu- 
able it  is.  A  doctor's  opinion  had  been  to  him 
a  mere  matter  of  guineas.  But  here  was  a  young 
man  who  seemed  to  care  nothing  either  for  his 
wealth  or  title.  His  respect  for  his  judgment  in- 
creased amazingly. 

"  Tut !  tut !  "  said  he  ;  "  Mason  is  not  so  thin- 
skinned.  There  !  there  !  Have  your  way  !  Do 
what  you  like  and  I  won't  say  another  word.  I'll 
just  run  upstairs  and  tell  Lady  Millbank  that  you 
are  coming." 

The  door  had  hardly  closed  behind  him  when 
the  two  demure  young  ladies  darted  out  of  their 
corner,  and  fluttered  with  joy  in  front  of  the 
astonished  doctor. 

"  Oh,  well  done  !  well  done  !  "  cried  the  taller, 
clapping  her  hands. 

"Don't  let  him  bully  you,  doctor,"  said  the 
other.     "  Oh,  it  was  so  nice  to  hear  you  stand  up 


A  FALSE  START.  79 

to  him.  That's  the  way  he  does  with  poor  Dr. 
Mason.  Dr.  Mason  has  never  examined  mamma 
yet.  He  always  takes  papa's  word  for  everything. 
Hush,  Maude  ;  here  he  comes  again."  They  sub- 
sided in  an  instant  into  their  corner  as  silent  and 
demure  as  ever. 

Dr.  Horace  Wilkinson  followed  Sir  John  up 
the  broad,  thick-carpeted  staircase,  and  into  the 
darkened  sick  room.  In  a  quarter  of  an  hour  he 
had  sounded  and  sifted  the  case  to  the  uttermost, 
and  descended  with  the  husband  once  more  to 
the  drawing-room.  Ii^Jront  of  the  fireplace  were 
standing  two  gentlemen,  the  one  a  very  typical, 
clean-shaven,  general  practitioner,  the  other  a 
striking-looking  man  of  middle  age,  with  pale 
blue  eyes  and  a  long  red  beard. 

"  Hullo,  Mason,  you've  come  at  last !  " 

"Yes,  Sir  John,  and  I  have  brought,  as  I 
promised.  Dr.  Wilkinson  with  me." 

"  Dr.  Wilkinson  !     Why,  this  is  he." 

Dr.  Mason  stared  in  astonishment.  "I  have 
never  seen  the  gentleman  before  !  "  he  cried. 

'^Nevertheless  I  am  Dr.  Wilkinson  —  Dr. 
Horace  Wilkinson,  of  114  Canal  View.'^ 

"  Good  gracious.  Sir  John  !  "  cried  Dr.  Mason. 
"Did  you  think  that  in  a  case  of  such  importance 
I  should  call  in  a  junior  local  practitioner  ?  ^  This 
is  Dr.  Adam  Wilkinson,  lecturer  on  pulmonary 
diseases  at  Regent's  College,  London,  physician 


80  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

upon  the  staff  of  the  St.  S within' s  Hospital,  and 
author  of  a  dozen  works  upon  the  subject.  He 
happened  to  be  in  Sutton  upon  a  visit,  and  I 
thought  I  would  utilise  his  presence  to  have  a 
first-rate  opinion  upon  Lady  Millbank." 

" Thank  you,"  said  Sir  John,  dryly.  "But  I 
fear  my  wife  is  rather  tired  now,  for  she  has  just 
been  very  thoroughly  examined  by  this  young 
gentleman.  I  think  we  will  let  it  stop  at  that  for 
the  present ;  though,  of  course,  as  you  have  had 
the  trouble  of  coming  here,  I  should  be  glad  to 
have  a  note  of  your  fees." 

When  Dr.  Mason  had  departed,  looking  very 
disgusted,  and  his  friend,  the  specialist,  very 
amused.  Sir  John  listened  to  all  the  young  physi- 
cian had  to  say  about  the  case. 

"]S[.ow,  I'll  tell  you  what,"  said  he,  when  he 
had  finished.  "  I'm  a  man  of  my  word,  d'ye  see  ? 
When  I  like  a  man  I  freeze  to  him.  I'm  a  good 
friend  and  a  bad  enemy.  I  believe  in  you,  and 
I  don't  believe  in  Mason.  From  how  on  you  are 
my  doctor,  and  that  of  my  family.  Come  and 
see  my  wife  every  day.  How  does  that  suit  your 
book?" 

"I  am  extremely  grateful  to  you  for  your  kind 
intentions  toward  me,  but  I  am  afraid  there  is  no 
possible  way  in  which  I  can  avail  myself  of 
them." 

"Heh!  what  d'ye  mean ?" 


A  FALSE  START.  gj 

"I  could  not  possibly  take  Dr.  Mason's  place 
in  the  middle  of  a  case  like  this.  It  would  be  a 
most  unprofessional  act." 

"Oh,  well,  go  your  own  way  !  "  cried  Sir  John, 
in  despair.  "  Never  was  such  a  man  for  making 
difficulties.  You've  had  a  fair  offer  and  you've 
refused  it,  and  now  you  can  just  go  your  own 
way." 

The_ millionaire  stumped  out  of  the  room  in  a 
huff,  and  Dr.  Horace  Wilkinson  made  his  way 
homeward  to  his  spirit-lamp  and  his  one-and- 
eightpenny  tea,  with  his  first  guinea  in  his 
pocket,  and  with  a  feeling  that  he  had  upheld  the 
best  traditions  of  his  profession. 

And  yet  this  false  start  of  his  was  a  true  start 
also,  for  it  soon  came  to  Dr.  Mason's  ears  that  his 
Junior  had  had  it  in  his  power  to  carry  off  his 
best  patient  and  had  forborne  to  do  so.  To  the 
honour  of  the  profession  be  it  said  that  such  for- 
bearance is  the  rule  rather  than  the  exception, 
and  yet  in  this  case,  with  so  very  Junior  a  practi- 
tioner and  so  very  wealthy  a  patient,  the  tempta- 
tion was  greater  than  is  usual^  There  was  a 
grateful  note,  a  visit,  a  friendship,  and  now  the 
well-known  firm  of  Mason  and  Wilkinson  is 
doing  the  largest  family  practice  in  Sutton. 


THE  CUKSE  OF  EVE. 

RoBEET  Johnson  was  an  essentially  common- 
place man,  with  no  feature  to  distinguish  him 
from  a  million  others.  He  was  pale  of  face,  or- 
dinary in  looks,  neutral  in  opinions,  thirty  years 
of  age,  and  a  married  man.  By  trade  he  was  a 
gentleman's  outfitter  in  the  New  North  Road,  and 
the  competition  of  business  squeezed  out  of  him 
the  little  character  that  was  left.  In  his  hope  of 
conciliating  customers  he  had  become  cringing 
and  pliable,  until  working  ever  in  the  same  rou- 
tine from  day  to  day  he  seemed  to  have  sunk  into 
a  soulless  machine  rather  than  a  man.  No  great 
question  had  ever  stirred  him.  At  the  end  of 
this  snug  century,  self-contained  in  his  own  nar- 
row circle,  it  seemed  impossible  that  any  of  the 
mighty,  primitive  passions  of  mankind  could  ever 
reach  him.  Yet  birth,  and  lust,  and  illness,  and 
death  are  changeless  things,  and  when  one  of 
these  harsh  facts  springs  out  upon  a  man  at  some 
sudden  turn  of  the  path  of  life,  it  dashes  off  for 
the  moment  his  mask  of  civilisation  and  gives  a 
glimpse  of  the  stranger  and  stronger  face  below. 


THE  CURSE  OF  EVE.  83 

Jolinson's  wife  was  a  quiet  little  woman,  with 
.brown  hair  and  gentle  ways.  His  affection  for 
her  was  the  one  positive  trait  in  his  character. 
Together  they  v^oiild  lay  out  the  shop  window 
every  Monday  morning,  the  spotless  shirts  in 
their  green  cardboard  boxes  below,  the  neckties 
above  hung  in  rows  over  the  brass  rails,  the  cheap 
studs  glistening  from  the  white  cards  at  either 
side,  while  in  the  background  were  the  rows  of 
cloth  caps  and  the  bank  of  boxes  in  which  the 
more  valuable  hats  were  screened  from  the  sun- 
light. She  kept  the  books  and  sent  out  the  bills. 
No  one  but  she  knew  the  joys  and  sorrows  which 
crept  into  his  small  life.  She  had  shared  his  ex- 
ultations when  the  gentleman  who  was  going  to 
India  had  bought  ten  dozen  shirts  and  an  incred- 
ible number  of  collars,  and  she  had  been  as 
stricken  as  he  when,  after  the  goods  had  gone,  the 
bill  was  returned  from  the  hotel  address  with  the 
intimation  that  no  such  person  had  lodged  there. 
For  five  years  they  had  worked,  building  up  the 
business,  thrown  together  all  the  more  closely 
because  their  marriage  had  been  a  childless  one. 
Now,  however,  there  were  signs  that  a  change 
was  at  hand,  and  that  speedily.  She  was  unable 
to  come  downstairs,  and  her  mother,  Mrs.  Peyton, 
came  over  from  Camberwell  to  nurse  her  and  to 
welcome  her  grandchild. 

Little  qualms  of  anxiety  came  over  Johnson  as 


84:  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

his  wife's  time  approaclied.  However,  after  all, 
it  was  a  natural  process.  Other  men's  wives  went 
through  it  unharmed,  and  why  should  not  his? 
He  was  himself  one  of  a  family  of  fourteen,  and 
yet  his  mother  was  alive  and  hearty.  It  was 
quite  the  exception  for  anything  to  go  wrong. 
And  yet  in  spite  of  his  reasonings  the  remem- 
brance of  his  wife's  condition  was  always  like  a 
sombre  background  to  all  his  other  thoughts. 

Dr.  Miles  of  Bridport  Place,  the  best  man  in 
the  neighbourhood,  was  retained  five  months  in 
advance,  and,  as  time  stole  on,  many  little  pack- 
ets of  absurdly  small  white  garments  with  frill 
work  and  ribbons  began  to  arrive  among  the  big 
consignments  of  male  necessities.  And  then  one 
evening,  as  Johnson  was  ticketing  the  scarfs  in 
the  shop,  he  heard  a  bustle  upstairs,  and  Mrs. 
Peyton  came  running  down  to  say  that  Lucy  was 
bad  and  that  she  thought  the  doctor  ought  to  be 
there  without  delay. 

*  It  was  not  Robert  Johnson's  nature  to  hurry. 
He  was  j)rim  and  staid  and  liked  to  do  things  in 
an  orderly  fashion.  It  was  a  quarter  of  a  mile 
from  the  corner  of  the  New  North  Road  where 
his  shop  stood  to  the  doctor's  house  in  Bridport 
Place.  There  were  no  cabs  in  sight  so  he  set  off 
upon  foot,  leaving  the  lad  to  mind  the  shop.  At 
Bridport  Place  he  was  told  that  the  doctor  had 
just  gone  to  Harman  Street  to  attend  a  man  in  a 


THE  CURSE  OF  EVE.  85 

fit.  Johnson  started  off  for  Harman  Street,  los- 
ing a  little  of  his  primness  as  he  became  more 
anxious.  Two  full  cabs  but  no  empty  ones  passed 
him  on  the  way.  At  Harman  Street  he  learned 
that  the  doctor  had  gone  on  to  a  case  of  measles, 
fortunately  he  had  left  the  address— 69  Dunstan 
Road,  at  the  other  side  of  the  Regent's  Canal. 
Robert's  primness  had  vanished  now  as  he  thought 
of  the  women  waiting  at  home,  and  he  began  to 
run  as  hard  as  he  could  down  the  Kingsland 
Road.  Some  way  along  he  sprang  into  a  cab 
which  stood  by  the  curb  and  drove  to  Dunstan 
Road.  The  doctor  had  just  left,  and  Robert 
Johnson  felt  inclined  to  sit  down  upon  the  steps 
in  despair. 

Fortunately  he  had  not  sent  the  cab  away, 
and  he  was  soon  back  at  Bridport  Place.  Dr. 
Miles  had  not  returned  yet,  but  they  were  expect- 
ing him  every  instant.  Johnson  waited,  drum- 
ming his  fingers  on  his  knees,  in  a  high,  dim  lit 
room,  the  air  of  which  was  charged  with  a  faint, 
sickly  smell  of  ether.  The  furniture  was  massive, 
and  the  books  in  the  shelves  were  sombre,  and  a 
squat  black  clock  ticked  mournfully  on  the  man- 
telpiece. It  told  him  that  it  was  half-past  seven, 
and  that  he  had  been  gone  an  hour  and  a  quar- 
ter. Whatever  would  the  women  think  of  him  ! 
Every  time  that  a  distant  door  slammed  he 
sprang  from  his  chair  in  a  quiver  of  eagerness. 


86  ROUND  THE   RED   LAMP. 

His  ears  strained  to  catcli  the  deep  notes  of  the 
doctor's  voice.  And  then,  suddenly,  with  a  gush 
of  joy  he  heard  a  quick  step  outside,  and  the 
sharp  click  of  the  key  in  the  lock.  In  an  instant 
he  was  out  in  the  Tiall,  before  the  doctor's  foot 
was  over  the  threshold. 

"If  you  please,  doctor,  I've  come  for  you,"  he 
cried  ;  "  the  wife  was  taken  bad  at  six  o'clock." 

He  hardly  knew  what  he  expected  the  doctor 
to  do.  Something  very  energetic,  certainly — to 
seize  some  drugs,  perhaps,  and  rush  excitedly 
with  him  through  the  gaslit  streets.  Instead  of 
that  Dr.  Miles  threw  his  umbrella  into  the  rack, 
jerked  off  his  hat  with  a  somewhat  peevish  ges- 
ture, and  pushed  Johnson  back  into  the  room. 

"  Let's  see  !  You  did  engage  me,  didn't  you  ?  " 
he  asked  in  no  very  cordial  voice. 

"  Oh,  yes,  doctor,  last  November.  Johnson 
the  outfitter,  you  know,  in  the  New  North  Road." 

"Yes,  yes.  It's  a  bit  overdue,"  said  the  doctor, 
glancing  at  a  list  of  names  in  a  note-book  with  a 
very  shiny  cover.     "  Well,  how  is  she  ? " 

"I  don't " 

"Ah,  of  course,  it's  your  first.  You'll  know 
more  about  it  next  time." 

"Mrs.  Peyton  said  it  was  time  you  were 
there,  sir." 

"  My  dear  sir,  there  can  be  no  very  pressing 
hurry  in  a  first  case.     We  shall  have  an  all-night 


THE   CURSE  OF  EVE.  87 

affair,  I  fancy.  You  can't  get  an  engine  to  go 
without  coals,  Mr.  Johnson,  and  I  have  had  noth- 
ing but  a  light  lunch." 

"We  could  have  something  cooked  for  you — 
something  hot  and  a  cup  of  tea." 

"  Thank  you,  but  I  fancy  my  dinner  is  actually 
on  the  table.  I  can  do  no  good  in  the  earlier 
stages.  Go  home  and  say  that  I  am  coming,  and 
I  will  be  round  immediately  afterwards." 

A  sort  of  horror  filled  Robert  Johnson  as  he 
gazed  at  this  man  who  could  think  about  his  din- 
ner at  such  a  moment.  He  had  not  imagination 
enough  to  realise  that  the  experience  which  seemed 
so  appallingly  important  to  him,  was  the  merest 
everyday  matter  of  business  to  the  medical  man 
who  could  not  have  lived  for  a  year  had  he  not, 
amid  the  rush  of  work,  remembered  what  was  due 
to  his  own  health.  To  Johnson  he  seemed  little 
better  than  a  monster.  His  thoughts  were  bitter 
as  he  sped  back  to  his  shop. 

"  You've  taken  your  time,"  said  his  mother-in- 
law  reproachfully,  looking  down  the  stairs  as  he 
entered. 

"I  couldn't  help  it!"  he  gasped.  "Is  it 
over \ " 

"  Over  !  She's  got  to  be  worse,  poor  dear, 
before  she  can  be  better.     Where's  Dr.  Miles  ? " 

"  He's  coming  after  he's  had  dinner." 

The  old  woman  was  about  to  make  some  reply, 


88  ROUND  THE  RED   LAMP. 

when,  from  the  half-opened  door  behind  a  high 
whinnying  voice  cried  out  for  her.  She  ran  back 
and  closed  the  door,  while  Johnson,  sick  at  heart, 
turned  into  the  shop.  There  he  sent  the  lad  home 
and  busied  himself  frantically  in  putting  up  shut- 
ters and  turning  out  boxes.  When  all  was  closed 
and  finished  he  seated  himself  in  the  parlour  be- 
hind the  shop.  But  he  could  not  sit  still.  He 
rose  incessantly  to  walk  a  few  paces  and  then  fell 
back  into  a  chair  once  more.  Suddenly  the 
clatter  of  china  fell  upon  his  ear,  and  he  saw  the 
maid  pass  the  door  with  a  cup  on  a  tray  and  a 
smoking  teapot. 

"  Who  is  that  for,  Jane  ? "  he  asked. 

"  For  the  mistress,  Mr.  Johnson.  She  says  she 
would  fancy  it." 

There  was  immeasurable  consolation  to  him 
in  that  homely  cup  of  tea.  It  wasn't  so  very 
bad  after  all  if  his  wife  could  think  of  such 
things.  So  light-hearted  was  he  that  he  asked 
for  a  cup  also.  He  had  just  finished  it  when  the 
doctor  arrived,  with  a  small  black  leather  bag  in 
his  hand. 

"  Well,  how  is  she  ? "  he  asked  genially. 

"Oh,  she's  very  much  better,"  said  Johnson, 
with  enthusiasm. 

"Dear  me,  that's  bad!"  said  the  doctor. 
"Perhaps  it  will  do  if  I  look  in  on  my  morning 
round  ? " 


THE  CURSE   OF  EVE.  89 

"No,  no,"  cried  Johnson,  clutching  at  his 
thick  frieze  overcoat.  "  We  are  so  glad  that  you 
have  come.  And,  doctor,  please  come  down  soon 
and  let  me  know  what  you  think  about  it." 

The  doctor  passed  upstairs,  his  firm,  heavy 
steps  resounding  through  the  house.  Johnson 
could  hear  his  boots  creaking  as  he  walked  about 
the  floor  above  him,  and  the  sound  was  a  consola- 
tion to  him.  It  was  crisp  and  decided,  the  tread 
of  a  man  who  had  plenty  of  self-confidence.  Pres- 
e^^iy,  still  straining  his  ears  to  catch  what  was 
going  on,  he  heard  the  scraping  of  a  chair  as  it 
was  drawn  along  the  floor,  and  a  moment  later  he 
heard  the  door  fly  open  and  someone  come  rush- 
ing downstairs.  Johnson  sprang  up  with  his  hair 
bristling,  thinking  that  some  dreadful  thing  had 
occurred,  but  it  was  only  his  mother-in-law,  inco- 
herent with  excitement  and  searching  for  scissors 
and  some  tape.  She  vanished  again  and  Jane 
passed  up  the  stairs  with  a  pile  of  newly  aired 
linen.  Then,  after  an  interval  of  silence,  Johnson 
heard  the  heavy,  creaking  tread  and  the  doctor 
came  down  into  the  parlour. 

"That's  better,"  said  he,  pausing  with  his 
hand  upon  the  door.  "  You  look  pale,  Mr.  John- 
son." 

"Oh  no,  sir,  not  at  all,"  he  answered  deprecat- 
ingly,  mopping  his  brow  with  his  handkerchief. 

"  There  is  no  immediate  cause  for  alarm,"  said 


90  ROUND   THE  RED   LAMP. 

Dr.  Miles.  "The  case  is  not  all  that  we  could 
wish  it.     Still  we  will  hope  for  the  best." 

"  Is  there  danger,  sir  ?  "  gasped  Johnson. 

"Well,  there  is  always  danger,  of  course.  It 
is  not  altogether  a  favourable  case,  but  still  it 
might  be  much  worse.  I  have  given  her  a 
draught.  I  saw  as  I  jjassed  that  they  have  been 
doing  a  little  building  opposite  to  you.  It's  an 
improving  quarter.  The  rents  go  higher  and 
higher.  You  have  a  lease  of  your  own  little 
place,  eh  ? " 

"Yes,  sir,  yes!"  cried  Johnson,  whose  ears 
were  straining  for  every  sound  from  above,  and 
who  felt  none  the  less  that  it  was  very  soothing 
that  the  doctor  should  be  able  to  chat  so  easily  at 
such  a  time.  "  That's  to  say  no,  sir,  I  am  a  year- 
ly tenant." 

"Ah,  I  should  get  a  lease  if  I  were  you. 
There's  Marshall,  the  watchmaker,  down  the 
street.  I  attended  his  wife  twice  and  saw  him 
through  the  typhoid  when  they  took  up  the 
drains  in  Prince  Street.  I  assure  you  his  land- 
lord sprung  his  rent  nearly  forty  a  year  and  he 
had  to  pay  or  clear  out." 

"  Did  his  wife  get  through  it,  doctor  ?  " 

"  Oh  yes,  she  did  very  vrell.     Hullo  !  hullo  !  " 

He  slanted  his  ear  to  the  ceiling  with  a  ques- 
tioning face,  and  then  darted  swiftly  from  the 
room. 


THE  CURSE   OF   EVE.  91 

It  was  March  and  the  evenings  were  chill,  so 
Jane  had  lit  the  fire,  but  the  wind  drove  the 
smoke  downwards  and  the  air  was  full  of  its  acrid 
taint.  Johnson  felt  chilled  to  the  bone,  though 
rather  by  his  apprehensions  than  by  the  weather. 
He  crouched  over  the  fire  with  his  thin  white 
hands  held  out  to  the  blaze.  At  ten  o'clock  Jane 
brought  in  the  joint  of  cold  meat  and  laid  his 
place  for  supper,  but  he  could  not  bring  himself 
to  touch  it.  He  drank  a  glass  of  the  beer,  how- 
ever, and  felt  the  better  for  it.  The  tension  of  his 
nerves  seemed  to  have  reacted  upon  his  hearing, 
and  he  was  able  to  follow  the  most  trivial  things 
in  the  room  above.  Once,  when  the  iDeer  was  still 
heartening  him,  he  nerved  himself  to  creep  on 
tiptoe  up  the  stair  and  to  listen  to  what  was  going 
on.  The  bedroom  door  was  half  an  inch  open, 
and  through  the  slit  he  could  catch  a  glimpse 
of  the  clean-shaven  face  of  the  doctor,  looking 
wearier  and  more  anxious  than  before.  Then  he 
rushed  downstairs  like  a  lunatic,  and  running  to 
the  door  he  tried  to  distract  his  thoughts  by 
watching  what  was  going  on  in  the  street.  The 
shops  were  all  shut,  and  some  rollicking  boon 
companions  came  shouting  along  from  the  public- 
house.  He  stayed  at  the  door  until  the  stragglers 
had  thinned  down,  and  then  came  back  to  his 
seat  by  the  fire.  In  his  dim  brain  he  was  ask- 
ing himself  questions  which  had  never  intruded 


92  ROUND   THE   RED   LAMP. 

themselves  before.  Where  was  the  justice  of  it? 
What  had  his  sweet,  innocent  little  wife  done 
that  she  should  be  used  so  ?  Why  was  nature  so 
cruel  ?  He  was  frightened  at  his  owti  thoughts, 
and  yet  wondered  that  they  had  never  occurred 
to  him  before. 

As  the  early  morning  drew  in,  Johnson,  sick 
at  heart  and  shivering  in  every  limb,  sat  with  his 
great  coat  huddled  round  him,  staring  at  the  grey 
ashes  and  waiting  hopelessly  for  some  relief.  His 
face  was  white  and  clammy,  and  his  nerves  had 
been  numbed  into  a  half  conscious  state  by  the 
long  monotony  of  misery.  But  suddenly  all  his 
feelings  leapt  into  keen  life  again  as  he  heard  the 
bedroom  door  open  and  the  doctor's  steps  upon 
the  stair.  Robert  Johnson  was  precise  and  un- 
emotional in  everyday  life,  but  he  almost  shrieked 
now  as  he  rushed  forward  to  know  if  it  were  over. 

One  glance  at  the  stern,  drawn  face  which  met 
him  showed  that  it  was  no  pleasant  news  which 
had  sent  the  doctor  downstairs.  His  appearance 
had  altered  as  much  as  Johnson's  during  the  last 
few  hours.  His  hair  was  on  end,  his  face  flushed, 
his  forehead  dotted  with  beads  of  perspiration. 
There  was  a  peculiar  fierceness  in  his  eye,  and 
about  the  lines  of  his  mouth,  a  fighting  look  as 
befitted  a  man  who  for  hours  on  end  had  been 
striving  with  the  hungriest  of  foes  for  the  most 
precious  of  prizes.     But  there  was  a  sadness  too, 


THE  CURSE   OF  EVE.  93 

as  though  his  grim  opponent  had  been  overmas- 
tering him.  He  sat  down  and  leaned  his  head 
upon  his  hand  like  a  man  who  is  fagged  out. 

"I  thought  it  my  duty  to  see  you,  Mr.  John- 
son, and  to  tell  you  that  it  is  a  very  nasty  case. 
Your  wife's  heart  is  not  strong,  and  she  has  some 
symptoms  which  I  do  not  like.  What  I  wanted 
to  say  is  that  if  you  would  like  to  have  a  second 
opinion  I  shall  be  very  glad  to  meet  anyone  whom 
you  might  suggest." 

Johnson  was  so  dazed  by  his  want  of  sleep 
and  the  evil  news  that  he  could  hardly  grasp 
the  doctor's  meaning.  The  other,  seeing  him 
hesitate,  thought  that  he  was  considering  the 
expense. 

"  Smith  or  Hawley  would  come  for  two 
guineas,"  said  he.  "But  I  think  Pritchard  of 
the  City  Road  is  the  best  man." 

*'  Oh,  yes,  bring  the  best  man,"  cried  Johnson. 

"Pritchard  would  want  three  guineas.  He  is 
a  senior  man,  you  see." 

"  rd  give  him  all  I  have  if  he  would  pull  her 
through.     Shall  I  run  for  him  ? " 

"  Yes.  Go  to  my  house  first  and  ask  for  the 
green  baize  bag.  The  assistant  will  give  it  to 
you.  Tell  him  I  want  the  A.  C.  E.  mixture.  Her 
heart  is  too  weak  for  chloroform.  Then  go  for 
Pritchard  and  bring  him  back  with  you." 

It  was  heavenly  for  Johnson  to  have  something 


94  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

to  do  and  to  feel  that  he  was  of  some  use  to  his 
wife.  He  ran  swiftly  to  Bridport  Place,  his  foot- 
falls clattering  through  the  silent  streets  and  the 
big  dark  policemen  turning  their  yellow  funnels 
of  light  on  him  as  he  passed.  Two  tugs  at  the 
night-bell  brought  down  a  sleepy,  half-clad  assist- 
ant, who  handed  him  a  stoppered  glass  bottle  and 
a  cloth  bag  which  contained  something  which 
clinked  when  you  moved  it.  Johnson  thrust  the 
bottle  into  his  pocket,  seized  the  green  bag,  and 
pressing  his  hat  firmly  down  ran  as  hard  as  he 
could  set  foot  to  ground  until  he  was  in  the  City 
Road  and  saw  the  name  of  Pritchard  engraved  in 
white  upon  a  red  ground.  He  bounded  in  tri- 
umph up  the  three  steps  which  led  to  the  door, 
and  as  he  did  so  there  was  a  crash  behind  him. 
His  precious  bottle  was  in  fragments  upon  the 
pavement. 

For  a  moment  he  felt  as  if  it  were  his  wife's 
body  that  was  lying  there.  But  the  run  had 
freshened  his  wits  and  he  saw  that  the  mischief 
might  be  repaired.  He  pulled  vigorously  at  the 
night-bell. 

"Well,  what's  the  matter?"  asked  a  gruff 
voice  at  his  elbow.  He  started  back  and  looked 
up  at  the  windows,  but  there  was  no  sign  of  life. 
He  was  approaching  the  bell  again  with  the  in- 
tention of  pulling  it,  when  a  perfect  roar  burst 
from  the  wall. 


THE  CURSE  OF  EVE.  95 

"  I  can't  stand  shivering  here  all  night,"  cried 
the  voice.  "  Say  who  you  are  and  what  you  want 
or  I  shut  the  tube." 

Then  for  the  first  time  Johnson  saw  that  the 
end  of  a  speaking-tube  hung  out  of  the  wall  just 
above  the  bell.     He  shouted  up  it, — 

"I  want  you  to  come  with  me  to  meet  Dr. 
Miles  at  a  confinement  at  once." 

"  How  far  'I "  shrieked  the  irascible  voice. 

"The  New  North  Koad,  Hoxton." 

"  My  consultation  fee  is  three  guineas,  payable 
at  the  time." 

"All  right,"  shouted  Johnson.  "You  are  to 
bring  a  bottle  of  A.  C.  E.  mixture  with  you." 

"All  right!    Wait  a  bit !  " 

Five  minutes  later  an  elderly,  hard-faced  man, 
with  grizzled  hair,  flung  open  the  door.  As  he 
emerged  a  voice  from  somewhere  in  the  shadows 
cried, — 

"Mind  you  take  your  cravat,  John,"  and  he 
impatiently  growled  something  over  his  shoulder 
in  reply. 

The  consultant  was  a  man  who  had  been  hard- 
ened by  a  life  of  ceaseless  labour,  and  who  had 
been  driven,  as  so  many  others  have  been,  by  the 
needs  of  his  own  increasing  family  to  set  the 
commercial  before  the  philanthropic  side  of  his 
profession.  Yet  beneath  his  rough  crust  he  was 
a  man  with  a  kindly  heart, 


96  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

"We  don't  want  to  break  a  record,"  said  he, 
pulling  up  and  panting  after  attempting  to  keep 
up  with  Johnson  for  five  minutes.  "I  would  go 
quicker  if  I  could,  my  dear  sir,  and  I  quite  sym- 
pathise with  your  anxiety,  but  really  I  can't  man- 
age it." 

So  Johnson,  on  fire  with  impatience,  had  to 
slow  down  until  they  reached  the  'New  North 
Road,  when  he  ran  ahead  and  had  the  door  open 
for  the  doctor  when  he  came.  He  heard  the  two 
meet  outside  the  bed-room,  and  caught  scraps  of 
their  conversation.  "  Sorry  to  knock  you  up — 
nasty  case — decent  people."  Then  it  sank  into  a 
mumble  and  the  door  closed  behind  them. 

Johnson  sat  up  in  his  chair  now,  listening 
keenly,  for  he  knew  that  a  crisis  must  be  at  hand. 
He  heard  the  two  doctors  moving  about,  and  was 
able  to  distinguish  the  step  of  Pritchard,  which 
had  a  drag  in  it,  from  the  clean,  crisp  sound  of 
the  other's  footfall.  There  was  silence  for  a  few 
minutes  and  then  a  curious  drunken,  mumbling 
sing-song  voice  came  quavering  up,  very  unlike 
anything  which  he  had  heard  hitherto.  At  the 
same  time  a  sweetish,  insidious  scent,  impercepti- 
ble perhaps  to  any  nerves  less  strained  than  his, 
crept  down  the  stairs  and  penetrated  into  the 
room.  The  voice  dwindled  into  a  mere  drone  and 
finally  sank  away  into  silence,  and  Johnson  gave 
a  long  sigh  of  relief,  for  he  knew  that  the  drug 


THE  CURSE  OP  EVE.  97 

had  done  its  work  and  that,  come  what  might, 
there  should  be  no  more  pain  for  the  sufferer. 

But  soon  the  silence  became  even  more  trying 
to  him  than  the  cries  had  been.  He  had  no  clue 
now  as  to  what  was  going  on,  and  his  mind 
swarmed  with  horrible  possibilities.  He  rose  and 
went  to  the  bottom  of  the  stairs  again.  He  heard 
the  clink  of  metal  against  metal,  and  the  subdued 
murmur  of  the  doctors'  voices.  Then  he  heard 
Mrs.  Peyton  say  something,  in  a  tone  as  of  fear 
or  expostulation,  and  again  the  doctors  murmured 
together.  For  twenty  minutes  he  stood  there 
leaning  against  the  wall,  listening  to  the  occa- 
sional rumbles  of  talk  without  being  able  to  catch 
a  word  of  it.  And  then  of  a  sudden  there  rose 
out  of  the  silence  the  strangest  little  piping  cry, 
and  Mrs.  Peyton  screamed  out  in  her  delight  and 
the  man  ran  into  the  parlour  and  flung  himself 
down  upon  the  horse-hair  sofa,  drumming  his 
heels  on  it  in  his  ecstasy. 

But  often  the  great  cat  Fate  lets  us  go  only  to 
clutch  us  again  in  a  fiercer  grip.  As  minute  after 
minute  passed  and  still  no  sound  came  from  above 
save  those  thin,  glutinous  cries,  Johnson  cooled 
from  his  frenzy  of  joy,  and  lay  breathless  with  his 
ears  straining.  They  w-ere  moving  slowly  about. 
They  were  talking  in  subdued  tones.  Still  minute 
after  minute  passing,  and  no  word  from  the  voice 
for  which  he  listened.     His  nerves  were  dulled 


98  ROUND   THE   RED   LAMP. 

by  his  night  of  trouble,  and  he  waited  in  limp 
wretchedness  upon  his  sofa.  There  he  still  sat 
when  the  doctors  came  down  to  him — a  bedrag- 
gled, miserable  figure  with  his  face  grimy  and  his 
hair  unkempt  from  his  long  vigil.  He  rose  as 
they  entered,  bracing  himself  against  the  mantel- 
piece. 

"  Is  she  dead  ? "  he  asked. 

"  Doing  well,"  answered  the  doctor. 

And  at  the  words  that  little  conventional  spirit 
which  had  never  known  until  that  night  the  ca- 
pacity for  fierce  agony  which  lay  within  it, 
learned  for  the  second  time  that  there  were 
springs  of  joy  also  which  it  had  never  tapped  be- 
fore. His  impulse  was  to  fall  upon  his  knees,  but 
he  was  shy  before  the  doctors. 

"Can  I  go  up?" 

"  In  a  few  minutes." 

"I'm  sure,  doctor,  I'm  very — I'm  very "  he 

grew  inarticulate.  "Here  are  your  three  guineas. 
Dr.  Prit chard.  I  wish  they  were  three  hun- 
dred." 

"So  do  I,"  said  the  senior  man,  and  they 
laughed  as  they  shook  hands. 

Johnson  opened  the  shop  door  for  them  and 
heard  their  talk  as  they  stood  for  an  instant  out- 
side. 

"Looked  nasty  at  one  time." 

"Very  glad  to  have  your  help." 


THE   CURSE  OF  EVE.  99 

"Delighted,  I'm  sure.  Won't  you  step  round 
and  have  a  cup  of  coffee  ? " 

"  No,  thanks.     I'm  expecting  another  case." 

The  firm  step  and  the  dragging  one  passed 
away  to  the  right  and  the  left.  Johnson  turned 
from  the  door  still  with  that  turmoil  of  joy  in  his 
heart.  He  seemed  to  be  making  a  new  start  in 
life.  He  felt  that  he  was  a  stronger  and  a  deeper 
man.  Perhai:)S  all  this  suffering  had  an  object 
then.  It  might  prove  to  be  a  blessing  both  to  his 
wife  and  to  him.  The  very  thought  was  one 
which  he  would  have  been  incapable  of  conceiving 
tAvelve  hours  before.  He  was  full  of  new  emo- 
tions. If  there  had  been  a  harrowing  there  had 
been  a  planting  too. 

"Can  I  come  up?"  he  cried,  and  then,  without 
waiting  for  an  answer,  he  took  the  steps  three  at  a 
time. 

Mrs.  Peyton  was  standing  by  a  soapy  bath 
with  a  bundle  in  her  hands.  From  under  the 
curve  of  a  brown  shawl  there  looked  out  at  him 
the  strangest  little  red  face  with  crumpled  fea- 
tures, moist,  loose  lips,  and  eyelids  which  quivered 
like  a  rabbit's  nostrils.  The  weak  neck  had  let 
the  head  topple  over,  and  it  rested  upon  the 
shoulder. 

"Kiss  it,  Robert!"  cried  the  grandmother. 
"Kiss  your  son!" 

But  he  felt  a  resentment   to  the  little,  red, 


100  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

blinking  creature.  He  could  not  forgive  it  yet  for 
that  long  night  of  misery.  He  caught  sight  of  a 
white  face  in  the  bed  and  he  ran  towards  it  with 
such  love  and  pity  as  his  speech  could  find  no 
words  for. 

"Thank  God  it  is  over!  Lucy,  dear,  it  was 
dreadful ! " 

"But  I'm  so  happy  now.  I  never  was  so 
happy  in  my  life." 

Her  eyes  were  fixed  upon  the  browTi  bundle. 

"You  mustn't  talk,"  said  Mrs.  Peyton. 

"But  don't  leave  me,"  whispered  his  wife. 

So  he  sat  in  silence  with  his  hand  in  hers. 
The  lamp  was  burning  dim  and  the  first  cold 
light  of  dawn  was  breaking  through  the  window. 
The  night  had  been  long  and  dark  but  the  day 
was  the  sweeter  and  the  purer  in  consequence. 
London  was  waking  up.  The  roar  began  to  rise 
from  the  street.  Lives  had  come  and  lives  had 
gone,  but  the  great  machine  was  still  working  out 
its  dim  and  tragic  destiny. 


SWEETHEARTS. 

It  is  hard  for  the  general  practitioner  who  sits 
among  his  patients  both  morning  and  evening,  and 
sees  them  in  their  homes  between,  to  steal  time 
for  one  little  daily  breath  of  cleanly  air.  To  win 
it  he  must  slip  early  from  his  bed  and  walk  out 
between  shuttered  shops  when  it  is  chill  but  very 
clear,  and  all  things  are  sharply  outlined,  as  in  a 
frost.  It  is  an  hour  that  has  a  charm  of  its  own, 
when,  but  for  a  postman  or  a  milkman,  one  has 
the  pavement  to  oneself,  and  even  the  most  com- 
mon thing  takes  an  ever-recurring  freshness,  as 
though  causeway,  and  lamp,  and  signboard  had  all 
wakened  to  the  new  day.  Then  even  an  inland 
city  may  seem  beautiful,  and  bear  virtue  in  its 
smoke-tainted  air. 

But  it  was  by  the  sea  that  I  lived,  in  a  town 
that  was  unlovely  enough  were  it  not  for  its 
glorious  neighbour.  And  who  cares  for  the  town 
when  one  can  sit  on  the  bench  at  the  headland, 
and  look  out  over  the  huge,  blue  bay,  and  the 
yellow  scimitar  that  curves  before  it.     I  loved  it 

(101) 


102  ''         '    ''    'KaLf^b   THE   RED   LAMP. 

wlifeii''it^''great'i'ace  'was  freckled  with  the  .fishing 
boats,  and  I  loved  it  when  the  big  ships  went  past, 
far  out,  a  little  hillock  of  white  and  no  hull,  with 
topsails  curved  like  a  bodice,  so  stately  and  de- 
mure. But  most  of  all  I  loved  it  when  no  trace  of 
man  marred  the  majesty  of  Nature,  and  when  the 
sun-bursts  slanted  down  on  it  from  between  the 
drifting  rainclouds.  Then  I  have  seen  the  further 
edge  draped  in  the  gauze  of  the  driving  rain,  with 
its  thin  grey  shading  under  the  slow  clouds,  while 
my  headland  was  golden,  and  the  sun  gleamed 
upon  the  breakers  and  struck  deep  through  the 
green  weaves  beyond,  showing  up  the  purple 
patches  where  the  beds  of  seaweed  are  lying. 
Such  a  morning  as  that,  with  the  wind  in  his  hair, 
and  the  spray  on  his  lips,  and  the  cry  of  the  eddy- 
ing gulls  in  his  ear,  may  send  a  man  back  braced 
afresh  to  the  reek  of  a  sick-room,  and  the  dead, 
drab  weariness  of  practice. 

It  was  on  such  another  day  that  I  first  saw  my 
old  man.  He  came  to  my  bench  just  as  I  was 
leaving  it.  My  eye  must  have  picked  him  out 
even  in  a  crowded  street,  for  he  was  a  man  of 
large  frame  and  fine  presence,  with  something  of 
distinction  in  the  set  of  his  lip  and  the  poise  of 
his  head.  He  limped  up  the  winding  path  lean- 
ing heavily  upon  his  stick,  as  though  those  great 
shoulders  had  become  too  much  at  last  for  the 
failing  limbs  that  bore  them.     As  he  approached, 


SWEETHEARTS.  103 

my  eyes  caught  Nature's  danger  signal,  that  faint 
bluish  tinge  in  nose  and  lip  which  tells  of  a  labour- 
ing heart. 

"  The  brae  is  a  little  trying,  sir,"  said  I. 
"  Speaking  as  a  physician,  I  should  say  that 
you  would  do  well  to  rest  here  before  you  go 
further." 

He  inclined  his  head  in  a  stately,  old-world 
fashion,  and  seated  himself  upon  the  bench.  See- 
ing that  he  had  no  wish  to  speak  I  was  silent  also, 
but  I  could  not  help  watching  him  out  of  the 
corners  of  my  eyes,  for  he  was  such  a  wonderful 
survival  of  the  early  half  of  the  century,  with  his 
low-crowned,  curly-brimmed  hat,  his  black  satin 
tie  which  fastened  with  a  buckle  at  the  back,  and, 
above  all,  his  large,  fleshy,  clean-shaven  face  shot 
with  its  mesh  of  wrinkles.  Those  eyes,  ere  they 
had  grown  dim,  had  looked  out  from  the  box-seat 
of  mail  coaches,  and  had  seen  the  knots  of  navvies 
as  they  toiled  on  the  brown  embankments.  Those 
lips  had  smiled  over  the  first  numbers  of  "Pick- 
wick," and  had  gossiped  of  the  promising  young 
man  who  wrote  them.  The  face  itself  was  a 
seventy-year  almanack,  and  every  seam  an  entry 
upon  it  where  public  as  well  as  private  sorrow  left 
its  trace.  That  pucker  on  the  forehead  stood  for 
the  Mutiny,  perhaps  ;  that  line  of  care  for  the 
Crimean  winter,  it  may  be  ;  and  that  last  little 
sheaf  of  wrinkles,  as  my  fancy  hoped,  for  the 


104  ROUND  TEE  RED  LAMP. 

death  of  Gordon.  And  so,  as  I  dreamed  in  my 
foolish  way,  the  old  gentleman  with  the  shining 
stock  was  gone,  and  it  was  seventy  years  of  a 
great  nation's  life  that  took  shape  before  me  on 
the  headland  in  the  morning. 

But  he  soon  brought  me  back  to  earth  again. 
As  he  recovered  his  breath  he  took  a  letter  out  of 
his  pocket,  and,  putting  on  a  pair  of  horn-rimmed 
eye-glasses,  he  read  it  through  very  carefully. 
Without  any  design  of  playing  the  spy  I  could 
not  help  observing  that  it  was  in  a  woman's  hand. 
When  he  had  finished  it  he  read  it  again,  and 
then  sat  with  the  corners  of  his  mouth  drawn 
down  and  his  eyes  staring  vacantly  out  over  the 
bay,  the  most  forlorn-looking  old  gentleman  that 
ever  I  have  seen.  All  that  is  kindly  within  me 
was  set  stirring  by  that  wistful  face,  but  I  knew 
that  he  was  in  no  humour  for  talk,  and  so,  at 
last,  with  my  breakfast  and  my  patients  call- 
ing me,  I  left  him  on  the  bench  and  started  for 
home. 

I  never  gave  him  another  thought  until  the 
next  morning,  when,  at  the  same  hour,  he  turned 
up  upon  the  headland,  and  shared  the  bench 
which  I  had  been  accustomed  to  look  upon  as 
my  own.  He  bowed  again  before  sitting  do^vn, 
but  was  no  more  inclined  than  formerly  to  enter 
into  conversation.  There  had  been  a  change  in 
him  during  the  last  twenty-four  hours,  and  all 


SWEETHEARTS.  105 

for  tlie  worse.  The  face  seemed  more  lieavy  and 
more  wrinkled,  while  that  ominous  venous  tinge 
was  more  pronounced  as  he  panted  up  the  hill. 
The  clean  lines  of  his  cheek  and  chin  were  marred 
by  a  day's  growth  of  grey  stubble,  and  his  large, 
shapely  head  had  lost  something  of  the  brave 
carriage  which  had  struck  me  when  first  I  glanced 
at  him.  He  had  a  letter  there,  the  same,  or  an- 
other, but  still  in  a  woman's  hand,  and  over  this 
he  was  moping  and  mumbling  in  his  senile  fash- 
ion, with  his  brow  puckered,  and  the  corners  of 
his  mouth  drawn  down  like  those  of  a  fretting 
child.  So  I  left  him,  with  a  vague  w^onder  as  to 
who  he  might  be,  and  why  a  single  spring  day 
should  have  wrought  such  a  change  upon  him. 

So  interested  was  I  that  next  morning  I  was  on 
the  look  out  for  him.  Sure  enough,  at  the  same 
hour,  I  saw  him  coming  up  the  hill ;  but  very 
slowly,  with  a  bent  back  and  a  heavy  head.  It 
was  shocking  to  me  to  see  the  change  in  him  as 
he  approached. 

"  I  am  afraid  that  our  air  does  not  agree  with 
you,  sir,"  I  ventured  to  remark. 

But  it  was  as  though  he  had  no  heart  for  talk. 
He  tried,  as  I  thought,  to  make  some  fitting  re- 
ply, but  it  slurred  off  into  a  mumble  and  silence. 
How  bent  and  weak  and  old  he  seemed — ten  years 
older  at  the  least  than  when  first  I  had  seen  him  ! 
It  went  to  my  heart  to  see  this  fine  old  fellow 


106  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

wasting  away  before  my  eyes.  There  was  the 
eternal  letter  which  he  unfolded  with  his  shak- 
ing fingers.  Who  was  this  woman  whose  words 
moved  him  so  ?  Some  daughter,  perhaps,  or 
granddaughter,  who  should  have  been  the  light 

of  his  home  instead  of I  smiled  to  find  how 

bitter  I  was  growing,  and  how  swiftly  I  was  weav- 
ing a  romance  round  an  unshaven  old  man  and 
his  correspondence.  Yet  all  day  he  lingered  in 
my  mind,  and  I  had  fitful  glimpses  of  those  two 
trembling,  blue-veined,  knuckly  hands  with  the 
paper  rustling  between  them. 

I  had  hardly  hoped  to  see  him  again.  An- 
other day's  decline  must,  I  thought,  hold  him  to 
his  room,  if  not  to  his  bed.  Great,  then,  was  my 
surprise  when,  as  I  approached  my  bench,  I  saw 
that  he  was  already  there.  But  as  I  came  up  to 
him  I  could  scarce  be  sure  that  it  was  indeed  the 
same  man.  There  were  the  curly-brimmed  hat, 
and  the  shining  stock,  and  the  horn  glasses,  but 
where  were  the  stoop  and  the  grey-stubbled, 
pitiable  face  ?  He  was  clean-shaven  and  firm 
lipped,  with  a  bright  eye  and  a  head  that  poised 
itself  upon  his  great  shoulders  like  an  eagle  on  a 
rock.  His  back  was  as  straight  and  square  as  a 
grenadier's,  and  he  switched  at  the  pebbles  with 
his  stick  in  his  exuberant  vitality.  In  the  but- 
ton-hole of  his  well-brushed  black  coat  there 
glinted  a  golden  blossom,  and  the  corner  of  a 


SWEETHEARTS.  ,  107 

dainty  red  silk  handkercMef  lapped  over  from  his 
breast  pocket.  He  might  have  been  the  eldest 
son  of  the  weary  creature  who  had  sat  there  the 
morning  before. 

"Good  morning,  sir,  good  morning  !  "  he  cried 
with  a  merry  waggle  of  his  cane. 

"  Good  morning  !  "  I  answered  ;  "  how  beauti- 
ful the  bay  is  looking." 

"Yes,  sir,  but  you  should  have  seen  it  just 
before  the  sun  rose." 

"  What,  have  you  been  here  since  then  ?  " 

"  I  was  here  when  there  was  scarce  light  to  see 
the  path." 

"You  are  a  very  early  riser." 

"  On  occasion,  sir  ;  on  occasion  !  "  He  cocked 
his  eye  at  me  as  if  to  gauge  whether  I  were 
worthy  of  his  confidence.  "The  fact  is,  sir,  that 
my  wife  is  coming  back  to  me  to  day." 

I  suppose  that  my  face  showed  that  I  did  not 
quite  see  the  force  of  the  explanation.  My  eyes, 
too,  may  have  given  him  assurance  of  sympathy, 
for  he  moved  quite  close  to  me  and  began  speak- 
ing in  a  low,  confidential  voice,  as  if  the  matter 
were  of  such  weight  that  even  the  sea-gulls  must 
be  kept  out  of  our  councils. 

"  Are  you  a  married  man,  sir  1 " 

"  No,  I  am  not." 

"Ah,  then  you  cannot  quite  understand  it. 
My  wife  and  I  have  been  married  for  nearly  fifty 


108  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

years,  and  we  have  never  been  parted,  never  at 
all,  until  now." 

"  Was  it  for  long  ?  "  I  asked. 

"  Yes,  sir.  This  is  the  fourth  day.  She  had 
to  go  to  Scotland.  A  matter  of  duty,  you  under- 
stand, and  the  doctors  would  not  let  me  go.  Not 
that  I  would  have  allowed  them  to  stop  me,  but 
she  was  on  their  side.  Now,,  thank  God  !  it  is 
over,  and  she  may  be  here  at  any  moment." 

"Here!" 

"Yes,  here.  This  headland  and  bench  were 
old  friends  of  ours  thirty  years  ago.  The  people 
with  whom  we  stay  are  not,  to  tell  the  truth,  very 
congenial,  and  we  have  little  privacy  among  them. 
That  is  why  we  prefer  to  meet  here.  I  could  not 
be  sure  which  train  would  bring  her,  but  if  she 
had  come  by  the  very  earliest  she  would  have 
found  me  waiting." 

' '  In  that  case "  said  I,  rising. 

"No,  sir,  no,"  he  entreated,  "I  beg  that  you 
will  stay.  It  does  not  weary  you,  this  domestic 
talk  of  mine  ? " 

"On  the  contrary." 

"I  have  been  so  driven  inwards  during  these 

few  last  days  !   Ah,  what  a  nightmare  it  has  been  I 

Perhaps  it  may  seem  strange  to  you  that  an  old 

fellow  like  me  should  feel  like  this." 

"It  is  charming." 

"No  credit  to  me,  sir!     There's  not  a  man  on 


SWEETHEARTS.  109 

this  planet  but  would  feel  the  same  if  he  had  the 
good  fortune  to  be  married  to  such  a  woman. 
Perhaps,  because  you  see  me  like  this,  and  hear 
me  speak  of  our  long  life  together,  you  conceive 
that  she  is  old,  too. " 

He  laughed  heartily,  and  his  eyes  twinkled  at 
the  humour  of  the  idea. 

"She's  one  of  those  women,  you  know,  who 
have  j^outh  in  their  hearts,  and  so  it  can  never 
be  very  far  from  their  faces.  To  me  she's  just  as 
she  was  when  she  first  took  my  hand  in  hers  in 
'45.  A  wee  little  bit  stouter,  perhaps,  but  then, 
if  she  had  a  fault  as  a  girl,  it  was  that  she  was  a 
shade  too  slender.  She  was  above  me  in  station, 
you  know — I  a  clerk,  and  she  the  daughter  of  my 
employer.  Oh  !  it  was  quite  a  romance,  I  give 
you  my  word,  and  I  won  her ;  and,  somehow,  I 
have  never  got  over  the  freshness  and  the  wonder 
of  it.  To  think  that  that  sweet,  lovely  girl  has 
walked  by  my  side  all  through  life,  and  that  I 
have  been  able " 

He  stopped  suddenly,  and  I  glanced  round  at 
him  in  surprise.  He  was  shaking  all  over,  in 
every  fibre  of  his  great  body.  His  hands  were 
clawing  at  the  woodwork,  and  his  feet  shuffling 
on  the  gravel.  I  saw  what  it  was.  He  was  trying 
to  rise,  but  was  so  excited  that  he  could  not.  I 
half  extended  my  hand,  but  a  higher  courtesy 
constrained  me  to  draw  it  back  again  and  turn  my 


110  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

face  to  the  sea.  An  instant  afterwards  lie  was  up 
and  hurrying  down  the  path. 

A  woman  was  coming  towards  us.  She  was 
quite  close  before  he  had  seen  her— thirty  yards 
at  the  utmost.  I  know  not  if  she  had  ever  been 
as  he  described  her,  or  whether  it  was  but  some 
ideal  which  he  carried  in  his  brain.  The  person 
upon  whom  I  looked  w^as  tall,  it  is  true,  but  she 
was  thick  and  shapeless,  with  a  ruddy,  full-blown 
face,  and  a  skirt  grotesquely  gathered  up.  There 
was  a  green  ribbon  in  her  hat,  which  jarred  upon 
my  eyes,  and  her  blouse-like  bodice  was  full  and 
clumsy.  And  this  was  the  lovely  girl,  the  ever 
youthful !  My  heart  sank  as  I  thought  how  little 
such  a  woman  might  appreciate  him,  how  unwor- 
thy she  might  be  of  his  love. 

She  came  up  the  path  in  her  solid  way,  while 
he  staggered  along  to  meet  her.  Then,  as  they 
came  together,  looking  discreetly  out  of  the  fur- 
thest corner  of  my  eye,  I  saw  that  he  put  out 
both  his  hands,  while  she,  shrinking  from  a  pub- 
lic caress,  took  one  of  them  in  hers  and  shook  it. 
As  she  did  so  I  saw  her  face,  and  I  was  easy  in 
my  mind  for  my  old  man.  God  grant  that  when 
this  hand  is  shaking,  and  when  this  back  is 
bowed,  a  woman's  eyes  may  look  so  into  mine. 


A  PHYSIOLOGIST'S  WIFE. 

Professoe  Ainslie  Geey  had  not  come  clown 
to  breakfast  at  the  usual  hour.  The  pres- 
entation chiming-clock  which  stood  between  the 
terra-cotta  busts  of  Claude  Bernard  and  of  John 
Hunter  upon  the  dining-room  mantelpiece  had 
rung  out  the  half-hour  and  the  three-quarters. 
Now  its  golden  hand  was  verging  upon  the  nine, 
and  yet  there  were  no  signs  of  the  master  of  the 
house. 

It  was  an  unprecedented  occurrence.  During 
the  twelve  years  that  she  had  kept  house  for  him, 
his  youngest  sister  had  never  known  him  a  second 
behind  his  time.  She  sat  now  in  front  of  the 
high  silver  coffee-pot,  uncertain  w^hether  to  order 
the  gong  to  be  resounded  or  to  wait  on  in  silence. 
Either  course  might  be  a  mistake.  Her  brother 
was  not  a  man  who  permitted  mistakes. 

Miss  Ainslie  Grey  was  rather  above  the  middle 

height,  thin,  with  peering,   puckered  eyes,  and 

the  rounded  shoulders  which  mark  the  bookish 

woman.     Her  face  was  long  and  spare,  flecked 

(111) 


112  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

with  colour  above  tlie  cheek-bones,  with  a  rea- 
sonable, thoughtful  forehead,  and  a  dash  of  abso- 
lute obstinacy  in  her  thin  lips  and  prominent 
chin.  Snow-white  cuffs  and  collar,  with  a  plain 
dark  dress,  cut  with  almost  Quaker-like  sim- 
plicity, bespoke  the  primness  of  her  taste.  An 
ebony  cross  hung  over  her  flattened  chest.  She 
sat  very  upright  in  her  chair,  listening  with  raised 
eyebrows,  and  swinging  her  eye-glasses  back- 
wards and  forwards  with  a  nervous  gesture  which 
was  peculiar  to  her. 

Suddenly  she  gave  a  sharp,  satisfied  jerk  of 
the  head,  and  began  to  pour  out  the  coffee.  From 
outside  there  came  the  dull  thudding  sound  of 
heavy  feet  upon  thick  carpet.  The  door  swung 
open,  and  the  Professor  entered  with  a  quick, 
nervous  step.  He  nodded  to  his  sister,  and  seat- 
ing himseK  at  the  other  side  of  the  table,  began 
to  open  the  small  pile  of  letters  which  lay  beside 
his  plate. 

Professor  Ainslie  Grey  was  at  that  time  forty- 
three  years  of  age — nearly  twelve  years  older  than 
his  sister.  His  career  had  been  a  brilliant  one. 
At  Edinburgh,  at  Cambridge,  and  at  Vienna  he 
had  laid  the  foundations  of  his  great  reputation, 
both  in  physiology  and  in  zoology. 

His  pamphlet,  On  the  Mesoblastic  Origin  of 
Excitomotor  Nerve  Roots,  had  won  him  his  fel- 
lowship of  the  Royal  Society  ;  and  his  researches, 


A   PHYSIOLOGIST'S  WIFE.  II3 

Upon  the  Nature  of  Bathybius,  with  some  Re- 
marks upon  Lithococci,  had  been  translated  into 
at  least  three  European  languages.  He  had  been 
referred  to  by  one  of  the  greatest  living  authori- 
ties as  being  the  very  type  and  embodiment  of  all 
that  was  best  in  modern  science.  No  wonder, 
then,  that  when  the  commercial  city  of  Birches- 
pool  decided  to  create  a  medical  school,  they  were 
only  too  glad  to  confer  the  chair  of  physiology 
upon  Mr.  Ainslie  Grey.  They  valued  him  the 
more  from  the  conviction  that  their  class  was 
only  one  step  in  his  upward  journey,  and  that  the 
first  vacancy  would  remove  him  to  some  more 
illustrious  seat  of  learning. 

In  person  he  was  not  unlike  his  sister.  The 
same  eyes,  the  same  contour,  the  same  intellec- 
tual forehead.  His  lips,  however,  were  firmer,  and 
his  long,  thin,  lower  jaw  was  sharper  and  more 
decided.  He  ran  his  finger  and  thumb  down  it 
from  time  to  time,  as  he  glanced  over  his  letters. 

"Those  maids  are  very  noisy,"  he  remarked, 
as  a  clack  of  tongues  sounded  in  the  distance. 

"It  is  Sarah,"  said  his  sister;  "I  shall  speak 
about  it." 

She  had  handed  over  his  coffee-cup,  and  was 
sipping  at  her  own,  glancing  furtively  through 
her  narrowed  lids  at  the  austere  face  of  her 
brother. 

"The  first  great  advance  of  the  human  race," 


114  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

said  the  Professor,  "was  when,  by  the  davelop- 
ment  of  their  left  frontal  convolutions,  they  at- 
tained the  power  of  speech.  Their  second  advance 
was  when  they  learned  to  control  that  power. 
Woman  has  not  yet  attained  the  second  stage." 

He  half  closed  his  eyes  as  he  spoke,  and  thrust 
his  chin  forward,  but  as  he  ceased  he  had  a  trick 
of  suddenly  opening  both  eyes  very  wide  and 
staring  sternly  at  his  interlocutor. 

"  I  am  not  garrulous,  John,"  said  his  sister. 

"No,  Ada;  in  many  respects  you  approach 
the  superior  or  male  type." 

The  Professor  bowed  over  his  egg  with  the 
manner  of  one  who  utters  a  courtly  compliment ; 
but  the  lady  pouted,  and  gave  an  impatient  little 
shrug  of  her  shoulders. 

"You  were  late  this  morning,  John,"  she  re- 
marked, after  a  pause. 

"  Yes,  Ada ;  I  slept  badly.  Some  little  cere- 
bral congestion,  no  doubt  due  to  over-stimulation 
of  the  centers  of  thought.  I  have  been  a  little 
disturbed  in  my  mind." 

His  sister  stared  across  at  him  in  astonishment. 
The  Professor's  mental  processes  had  hitherto 
been  as  regular  as  his  habits.  Twelve  years'  con- 
tinual intercourse  had  taught  her  that  he  lived 
in  a  serene  and  rarefied  atmosphere  of  scientific 
calm,  high  above  the  petty  emotions  which  affect 
humbler  minds. 


A   PHYSIOLOGIST'S  WIFE.  115 

'  "You  are  surprised,  Ada,"  he  remarked. 
"Well,  I  cannot  wonder  at  it.  I  should  have 
been  surprised  myself  if  I  had  been  told  that  I 
was  so  sensitive  to  vascular  influences.  For, 
after  all,  all  disturbances  are  vascular  if  you  probe 
them  deep  enough.  I  am  thinking  of  getting 
married." 

"Not  Mrs.  O' James  ?"  cried  Ada  Grey,  laying 
down  her  egg-spoon. 

"My  dear,  you  have  the  feminine  quality  of 
receptivity  very  remarkably  developed.  Mrs. 
O' James  is  the  lady  in  question." 

"But  you  know  so  little  of  her.  The  Esdailes 
themselves  know  so  little.  She  is  really  only  an 
acquaintance,  although  she  is  staying  at  The  Lin- 
dens. Would  it  not  be  wise  to  speak  to  Mrs.  Es- 
daile  first,  John  ?  " 

"I  do  not  think,  Ada,  that  Mrs.  Esdaile  is  at 
all  likely  to  say  anything  which  would  materially 
affect  my  course  of  action.  I  have  given  the  mat- 
ter due  consideration.  The  soientific  mind  is  slow 
at  arriving  at  conclusions,  but  having  once  formed 
them,  it  is  not  prone  to  change.  Matrimony  is 
the  natural  condition  of  the  human  race,  I  have, 
as  you  know,  been  so  engaged  in  academical  and 
other  work,  that  I  have  had  no  time  to  devote  to 
merely  personal  questions.  It  is  different  now, 
and  I  see  no  valid  reason  why  I  should  forego  this 
opportunity  of  seeking  a  suitable  helpmate." 


116  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

"  And  you  are  engaged  1  " 

"Hardly  that,  Ada.  I  ventured  yesterday  to 
indicate  to  the  lady  that  I  was  prepared  to  submit 
to  the  common  lot  of  humanity.  I  shall  wait 
upon  her  after  my  morning  lecture,  and  learn  how 
far  my  proposals  meet  with  her  acquiescence. 
But  you  frown,  Ada  !  " 

His  sister  started,  and  made  an  effort  to  con- 
ceal her  expression  of  annoyance.  She  even 
stammered  out  some  few  words  of  congratula- 
tion, but  a  vacant  look  had  come  into  her  broth- 
er's eyes,  and  he  was  evidently  not  listening 
to  her. 

"  I  am  sure,  John,  that  I  wish  you  the  happi- 
ness which  you  deserve.  If  I  hesitated  at  all,  it 
is  because  I  know  how  much  is  at  stake,  and  be- 
cause the  thing  is  so  sudden,  so  unexpected." 
Her  thin  white  hand  stole  up  to  the  black  cross 
upon  her  bosom.  "These  are  moments  when  we 
need  guidance,  John.  If  I  could  persuade  you  to 
turn  to  spiritual " 

The  Professor  waved  the  suggestion  away  with 
a  deprecating  hand. 

"It  is  useless  to  reopen  that  question,"  he 
said.  "We  cannot  argue  upon  it.  You  assume 
more  than  I  can  grant.  I  am  forced  to  dispute 
your  premisses.     We  have  no  common  basis." 

His  sister  sighed. 

"  You  have  no  faith,"  she  said. 


A    PHYSIOLOGIST'S   WIFE.  117 

"  I  have  faith  in  those  great  evolutionary  forces 
which  are  leading  the  human  race  to  some  un- 
known but  elevated  goal." 

"  You  believe  in  nothing." 

"  On  the  contrary,  my  dear  Ada,  I  believe  in 
the  differentiation  of  protoplasm." 

She  shook  her  head  sadly.  It  was  the  one 
subject  upon  which  she  ventured  to  dispute  her 
brother's  infallibility. 

"This  is  rather  beside  the  question,"  remarked 
the  Professor,  folding  up  his  napkin.  "If  lam 
not  mistaken,  there  is  some  possibility  of  another 
matrimonial  event  occurring  in  the  family.  Eh, 
Ada?    What!" 

His  small  eyes  glittered  with  sly  facetiousness 
as  he  shot  a  twinkle  at  his  sister.  She  sat  very 
stiff,  and  traced  patterns  upon  the  cloth  with  the 
sugar-tongs. 

"Dr.  James  M'Murdo   O'Brien "  said  the 

Professor,  sonorously. 

"Don't,  John,  don't!"  cried  Miss  Ainslie 
Grey. 

"Dr.  James  M'Murdo  O'Brien,"  continued  her 
brother  inexorably,  "is  a  man  who  has  already 
made  his  mark  upon  the  science  of  the  day.  He 
is  my  first  and  my  most  distinguished  pupil.  I 
assure  you,  Ada,  that  his  '  Kemarks  upon  the  Bile- 
Pigments,  with  special  reference  to  Urobilin,'  is 
likely  to  live  as  a  classic.     It  is  not  too  much  to 


118  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

say  that  lie  has  revolutionised  our  views  about 
urobilin." 

He  paused,  but  his  sister  sat  silent,  with  bent 
head  and  flushed  cheeks.  The  little  ebony  cross 
rose  and  fell  with  her  hurried  breathings. 

"Dr.  James  M'Murdo  O'Brien  has,  as  you 
know,  the  offer  of  the  physiological  chair  at  Mel- 
bourne. He  has  been  in  Australia  five  years,  and 
has  a  brilliant  future  before  him.  To-day  he 
leaves  us  for  Edinburgh,  and  in  two  months'  time 
he  goes  out  to  take  over  his  new  duties.  You 
know  his  feeling  towards  you.  It  rests  with  you 
as  to  whether  he  goes  out  alone.  Speaking  for 
myself,  I  cannot  imagine  any  higher  mission  for  a 
woman  of  culture  than  to  go  through  life  in  the 
company  of  a  man  who  is  capable  of  snch  a  re- 
search as  that  which  Dr.  James  M'Murdo  O'Brien 
has  brought  to  a  successful  conclusion." 

"He  has  not  sjDoken  to  me,"  murmured  the 
lady. 

"Ah,  there  are  signs  which  are  more  subtle 
than  speech,"  said  her  brother,  wagging  his  head. 
"But  you  are  pale.  Your  vasomotor  system  is 
excited.  Your  arterioles  have  contracted.  Let 
me  entreat  you  to  compose  yourself.  I  think  I 
hear  the  carriage.  I  fancy  that  you  may  have  a 
visitor  this  morning,  Ada.  You  will  excuse  me 
now." 
♦  With  a  quick  glance  at  the  clock  he  strode  off 


A   PHYSIOLOGIST'S   WIPE.  119 

into  the  hall,  and  within  a  few  minutes  he  was 
rattling  in  his  quiet,  well-appointed  brougham 
through  the  brick-lined  streets  of  Birchespool. 

His  lecture  over,  Professor  Ainslie  Grey  pai^ 
a  visit  to  his  laboratory,  where  he  adjusted  sev^ 
era!  scientific  instruments,  made  a  note  as  to  the 
progress  of  three  separate  infusions  of  bacteria, 
cut  half-a-dozen  sections  with  a  microtome,  and 
finally  resolved  the  difllculties  of  seven  different 
gentlemen,  who  were  pursuing  researches  in  as 
many  separate  lines  of  inquiry.  Having  thus 
conscientiously  and  methodically  completed  the 
routine  of  his  duties,  he  returned  to  his  carriage 
and  ordered  the  coachman  to  drive  him  to  The 
Lindens.  His  face  as  he  drove  was  cold  and  im- 
passive, but  he  drew  his  fingers  from  time  to  time 
down  his  prominent  chin  with  a  jerky,  twitchy 
movement. 

The  Lindens  was  an  old-fashioned,  ivy-clad 
house  which  had  once  been  in  the  country,  but 
was  now  caught  in  the  long,  red-brick  feelers  of 
the  growing  city.  It  still  stood  back  from  the 
road  in  the  privacy  of  its  own  grounds.  A  wind- 
ing path,  lined  with  laurel  bushes,  led  to  the 
arched  and  porticoed  entrance.  To  the  right  was 
a  lawn,  and  at  the  far  side,  under  the  shadow  of  a 
hawthorn,  a  lady  sat  in  a  garden-chair  with  a 
book  in  her  hands.  At  the  click  of  the  gate  she 
started,  and  the  Professor,  catching  sight  of  her, 


120  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

turned  away  from  the  door,  and  strode  .in  her 
direction. 

"What!  won't  you  go  in  and  see  Mrs.  Es- 
daile  ? "  she  asked,  sweeping  out  from  under  the 
shadow  of  the  hawthorn. 

She  was  a  small  woman,  strongly  feminine, 
from  the  rich  coils  of  her  light-coloured  hair  to 
the  dainty  garden  slipper  which  peeped  from 
under  her  cream-tinted  dress.  One  tiny  well- 
gloved  hand  was  outstretched  in  greeting,  while 
the  other  pressed  a  thick,  green-covered  volume 
against  her  side.  Her  decision  and  quick,  tactful 
manner  bespoke  the  mature  woman  of  the  world  ; 
but  her  upraised  face  had  preserved  a  girlish 
and  even  infantile  expression  of  innocence  in 
its  large,  fearless,  grey  eyes,  and  sensitive,  hu- 
morous mouth.  Mrs.  O'James  was  a  widow, 
and  she  was  two-and-thirty  years  of  age ;  but 
neither  fact  could  have  been  deduced  from  her 
appearance. 

"You  will  surely  go  in  and  see  Mrs.  Esdaile," 
she  repeated,  glancing  up  at  him  with  eyes  which 
had  in  them  something  between  a  challenge  and  a 
caress. 

"I  did  not  come  to  see  Mrs.  Esdaile,"  he 
answered,  with  no  relaxation  of  his  cold  and  grave 
manner ;  "I  came  to  see  you." 

"  I  am  sure  I  should  be  highly  honoured,"  she 
said,  with  just  the  slightest  little  touch  of  brogue 


A  PHYSIOLOGIST'S   WIFE.  121 

in  her  accent.  "What  are  the  students  to  do 
without  their  Professor? " 

"I  have  already  completed  my  academic  du- 
ties. Take  my  arm,  and  we  shall  walk  in  the 
sunshine.  Surely  we  cannot  wonder  that  East- 
ern people  should  have  made  a  deity  of  the  sun. 
It  is  the  great  beneficent  force  of  Nature — man's 
ally  against  cold,  sterility,  and  all  that  is  abhor- 
rent to  him.     What  were  you  reading  ? " 

' '  Hale's  Matter  and  Life. " 

The  Professor  raised  his  thick  eyebrows. 

"  Hale  !  "  he  said,  and  then  again  in  a  kind  of 
whisper,  "Hale  !  " 

"  You  differ  from  him  ?  "  she  asked. 

"It  is  not  I  who  differ  from  him.  I  am  only 
a  monad — a  thing  of  no  moment.  The  whole 
tendency  of  the  highest  plane  of  modern  thought 
differs  from  him.  He  defends  the  indefensible. 
He  is  an  excellent  observer,  but  a  feeble  reasoner. 
I  should  not  recommend  you  to  found  your  con- 
clusions upon  Hale." 

"  I  must  read  Nature's  Chronicle  to  counteract 
his  pernicious  influence,"  said  Mrs.  0' James,  with 
a  soft,  cooing  laugh. 

Nature's  Chronicle  was  one  of  the  many  books 
in  which  Professor  Ainslie  Grey  had  enforced  the 
negative  doctrines  of  scientific  agnosticism. 

"  It  is  a  faulty  work, "  said  he ;  "I  cannot  recom  - 
mend  it.      I  would  rather  refer  you  to  the  stand- 


122  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

ard  writings  of  some  of  my  older  and  more  elo- 
quent colleagues." 

There  was  a  pause  in  their  talk  as  they  paced 
up  and  down  on  the  green,  velvet-like  lawn  in  the 
genial  sunshine. 

"Have  you  thought  at  all,"  he  asked  at  last, 
"of  the  matter  upon  which  I  spoke  to  you  last 
night  ? " 

She  said  nothing,  but  walked  by  his  side  with 
her  eyes  averted  and  her  face  aslant. 

"I  would  not  hurry  you  unduly,"  he  con- 
tinued. "I  know  that  it  is  a  matter  which  can 
scarcely  be  decided  off-hand.  In  my  own  case,  it 
cost  me  some  thought  before  I  ventured  to  make 
the  suggestion.  I  am  not  an  emotional  man,  but 
I  am  conscious  in  your  presence  of  the  great  evo- 
lutionary instinct  which  makes  either  sex  the 
complement  of  the  other." 

"You  believe  in  love,  then?"  she  asked,  with 
a  twinkling,  upward  glance. 

"I  am  forced  to." 

"  And  yet  you  can  deny  the  soul  ? " 

"How  far  these  questions  are  psychic  and  how 
far  material  is  still  sub  judice,''^  said  the  Professor, 
with  an  air  of  toleration.  ' '  Protoplasm  may  prove 
to  be  the  physical  basis  of  love  as  well  as  of  life." 

"How  inflexible  you  are!"  she  exclaimed; 
"  you  would  draw  love  down  to  the  level  of  phys- 
ics." 


A  PHYSIOLOGIST'S  WIPE.  123 

"  Or  draw  physics  up  to  the  level  of  love." 

"Come,  that  is  much  better,"  she  cried,  with 
her  sympathetic  laugh.  "That  is  really  very 
pretty,  and  puts  science  in  quite  a  delightful 
light." 

Her  eyes  sparkled,  and  she  tossed  her  chin 
with  the  pretty,  wilful  air  of  a  woman  who  is  mis- 
tress of  the  situation. 

"  I  have  reason  to  believe,"  said  the  Professor, 
"  that  my  position  here  will  prove  to  be  only  a 
stepping-stone  to  some  wider  scene  of  scientific 
activity.  Yet,  even  here,  my  chair  brings  me  in 
some  fifteen  hundred  pounds  a  year,  which  is 
supplemented  by  a  few  hundreds  from  my  books. 
I  should  therefore  be  in  a  position  to  provide  you 
with  those  comforts  to  which  you  are  accustomed. 
So  much  for  my  pecuniary  position.  As  to  my 
constitution,  it  has  always  been  sound.  I  have 
never  suffered  from  any  illness  in  my  life,  save 
fleeting  attacks  of  cephalalgia,  the  result  of  too 
prolonged  a  stimulation  of  the  centres  of  cerebra- 
tion. My  father  and  mother  had  no  sign  of  any 
morbid  diathesis,  but  I  will  not  conceal  from  you 
that  my  grandfather  was  afllicted  with  podagra." 

Mrs.  O'James  looked  startled. 

"  Is  that  very  serious  ? "  she  asked. 

"  It  is  gout,"  said  the  Professor. 

"Oh,  is  that  all?  It  sounded  much  worse 
than  that." 


124  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

"It  is  a  grave  taint,  but  I  trust  that  I  shall 
not  be  a  victim  to  atavism.  I  have  laid  these 
facts  before  you  because  they  are  factors  which 
cannot  be  overlooked  in  i'orraing  your  decision. 
May  I  ask  now  whether  you  see  your  way  to  ac- 
cepting my  proposal  ? " 

He  paused  in  his  walk,  and  looked  earnestly 
and  expectantly  down  at  her. 

A  struggle  wa?  evidently  going  on  in  her  mind. 
Her  eyes  were  cast  down,  her  little  slipper  tapped 
the  lawn,  and  her  fingers  played  nervously  with 
her  chatelain.  Suddenly,  with  a  sharp,  quick 
gesture  which  had  in  it  something  of  abandon 
and  recklessness,  she  held  out  her  hand  to  her 
companion. 

"  I  accept,"  she  said. 

They  were  standing  under  the  shadow  of  the 
hawthorn.  He  stooped  gravely  down,  and  kissed 
her  glove-covered  fingers. 

"I  trust  that  you  may  never  have  cause  to 
regret  your  decision,"  he  said. 

"  I  trust  that  you  never  may,"  she  cried,  with 
a  heaving  breast. 

There  were  tears  in  her  eyes,  and  her  lips 
twitched  with  some  strong  emotion. 

"Come  into  the  sunshine  again,"  said  he.  " It 
is  the  great  restorative.  Your  nerves  are  shaken. 
Some  little  congestion  of  the  medulla  and  pons. 
It  is  always  instructive  to  reduce  psychic  or  emo- 


A   PPIYSIOLOGIST'S    WIFE.  125 

tional  conditions  to  their  physical  equivalents. 
You  feel  that  your  anchor  is  still  firm  in  a  bottom 
of  ascertained  fact." 

"But  it  is  so  dreadfully  unromantic,"  said 
Mrs.  0' James,  with  her  old  twinkle. 

"  Romance  is  the  offspring  of  imagination  and 
of  ignorance.  Where  science  throws  her  calm, 
clear  light  there  is  happily  no  room  for  romance." 

"  But  is  not  love  romance  ?  "  she  asked. 

"  Not  at  all.  Love  has  been  taken  away  from 
the  poets,  and  has  been  brought  within  the  do- 
main of  true  science.  It  may  prove  to  be  one  of 
the  great  cosmic  elementary  forces.  When  the 
atom  of  hydrogen  draws  the  atom  of  chlorine 
towards  it  to  form  the  perfected  molecule  of  hy- 
drochloric acid,  the  force  which  it  exerts  may  be 
intrinsically  similar  to  that  which  draws  me  to 
you.  Attraction  and  repulsion  appear  to  be  the 
primary  forces.     This  is  attraction." 

"And  here  is  repulsion,"  said  Mrs.  0' James, 
as  a  stout,  florid  lady  came  sweeping  across  the 
lawn  in  their  direction.  "  So  glad  you  have  come 
out,  Mrs.  Esdaile  !     Here  is  Professor  Grey." 

"How  do  you  do.  Professor?"  said  the  lady, 
with  some  little  pomposity  of  manner.  "You 
were  very  wise  to  stay  out  here  on  so  lovely  a 
day.    Is  it  not  heavenly  ? " 

"It  is  certainly  very  fine  weather,"  the  Pro- 
fessor answered. 


126  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

"  Listen  to  the  wind  sighing  in  the  trees  !  " 
cried  Mrs.  Esdaile,  holding  up  one  finger.  "It 
is  Nature's  lullaby.  Could  you  not  imagine 
it,  Professor  Grey,  to  be  the  whisperings  of 
angels  ? " 

"The  idea  had  not  occurred  to  me,  madam." 

"Ah,  Professor,  I  have  always  the  same  com- 
plaint against  you.  A  want  of  rapport  with  the 
deeper  meanings  of  nature.  Shall  I  say  a  want  of 
imagination.  You  do  not  feel  an  emotional  thrill 
at  the  singing  of  that  thrush  ? " 

"I  confess  that  I  am  not  conscious  of  one, 
Mrs.  Esdaile." 

"Or  at  the  delicate  tint  of  that  background  of 
leaves  ?    See  the  rich  greens  !  " 

"Chlorophyll,"  murmured  the  Professor. 

"  Science  is  so  hopelessly  prosaic.  It  dissects 
and  labels,  and  loses  sight  of  the  great  things  in 
its  attention  to  the  little  ones.  You  have  a  poor 
opinion  of  woman's  intellect.  Professor  Grey.  I 
think  that  I  have  heard  you  say  so." 

"  It  is  a  question  of  avoirdupois,"  said  the  Pro- 
fessor, closing  his  eyes  and  shrugging  his  shoul- 
ders. "  The  female  cerebrum  averages  two  ounces 
less  in  weight  than  the  male.  No  doubt  there  are 
exceptions.     Nature  is  always  elastic." 

"But  the  heaviest  thing  is  not  always  the 
strongest,"  said  Mrs.  0' James,  laughing.  "Isn't 
there  a  law  of  compensation  in  science  ?    May  we 


A  PHYSIOLOGISTS  WIFE.  127 

not  hope  to  make  up  in  quality  for  what  we  hick 
in  quantity  ? " 

"I  think  not,"  remarked  the  Professor,  grave- 
ly. "But  there  is  your  luncheon-gong.  No, 
thank  you,  Mrs.  Esdaile,  I  cannot  stay.  My  car- 
riage is  waiting.  Good-bye.  Good-bye,  Mrs. 
O' James." 

He  raised  his  hat  and  stalked  slowly  away 
among  the  laurel  bushes. 

"He  has  no  taste,"  said  Mrs.  Esdaile — "no 
eye  for  beauty." 

"On  the  contrary,"  Mrs.  0' James  answered, 
with  a  saucy  little  jerk  of  the  chin.  "He  has 
just  asked  me  to  be  his  wife." 


As  Professor  Ainslie  Grey  ascended  the  steps 
of  his  house,  the  hall-door  opened  and  a  dapper 
gentleman  stepped  briskly  out.  He  was  some- 
what sallow  in  the  face,  with  dark,  beady  eyes, 
and  a  short,  black  beard  with  an  aggressive  bris- 
tle. Thought  and  work  had  left  their  traces  upon 
his  face,  but  he  moved  with  the  brisk  activity  of  a 
man  who  had  not  yet  bade  good-bye  to  his  youth. 

"  I'm  in  luck's  way,"  he  cried.  "I  wanted  to 
see  you." 

"Then  come  back  into  the  library,"  said  the 
Professor  ;  "  you  must  stay  and  have  lunch  with 
us." 


128  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

The  two  men  entered  the  hall,  and  the.  Pro- 
fessor led  the  way  into  his  private  sanctum.  He 
motioned  his  companion  into  an  arm-chair. 

"I  trust  that  you  have  been  successful, 
O'Brien,"  said  he.  "I  should  be  loath  to  exer- 
cise any  undue  pressure  upon  my  sister  Ada  ;  but 
I  have  given  her  to  understand  that  there  is  no 
one  whom  I  should  prefer  for  a  brother-in-law  to 
my  most  brilliant-  scholar,  the  author  of  Some 
Remarks  upon  the  Bile-Pigments,  with  special 
reference  to  Urobilin." 

"You  are  very  kind.  Professor  Grey — you 
have  always  been  very  kind,"  said  the  other.  "  I 
approached  Miss  Grey  upon  the  subject  ;  she  did 
not  say  No." 

"She  said  Yes,  then?" 

"N'o;  she  proposed  to  leave  the  matter  ojjen 
until  my  return  from  Edinburgh.  I  go  to-day,  as 
you  know,  and  I  hope  to  commence  my  research 
to-morrow." 

"On  the  comparative  anatomy  of  the  vermi- 
form appendix,  by  James  M'Murdo  O'Brien,"  said 
the  Professor,  sonorously.  "  It  is  a  glorious  sub- 
ject— a  subject  which  lies  at  the  very  root  of  evo- 
lutionary philosophy. " 

"Ah!  she  is  the  dearest  girl,"  cried  O'Brien, 
with  a  sudden  little  spurt  of  Celtic  enthusi- 
asm—  "she  is  the  soul  of  truth  and  of  hon- 
our." 


A   PnYSIOLOGIST'S   WIFE.  129 

"  The  vermiform  appendix "  began  the  Pro- 
fessor. 

"She  is  an  angel  from  heaven,"  interrupted 
the  other.  "  I  fear  that  it  is  my  advocacy  of  sci- 
entific freedom  in  religious  thought  which  stands 
in  my  way  with  her." 

"  You  must  not  truckle  upon  that  point.  You 
must  be  true  to  your  convictions  ;  let  there  be  no 
compromise  there." 

"My  reason  is  true  to  agnosticism,  and  yet  I 
am  conscious  of  a  void — a  vacuum.  I  had  feel- 
ings at  the  old  church  at  home  between  the  scent 
of  the  incense  and  the  roll  of  the  organ,  such  as  I 
have  never  experienced  in  the  laboratory  or  the 
lecture-room." 

"  Sensuous— purely  sensuous,"  said  the  Pro- 
fessor, rubbing  his  chin.  "Vague  hereditary 
tendencies  stirred  into  life  by  the  stimulation  of 
the  nasal  and  auditory  nerves." 

"Maybe  so,  maybe  so,"  the  younger  man  an- 
swered thoughtfully.  "But  this  was  not  what 
I  wished  to  speak  to  you  about.  Before  I  enter 
your  family,  your  sister  and  you  have  a  claim  to 
know  all  that  I  can  tell  you  about  my  career.  Of 
my  worldly  prospects  I  have  already  spoken  to 
you.  There  is  only  one  point  which  I  have 
omitted  to  mention.     I  am  a  widower." 

The  Professor  raised  his  eyebrows. 

"  This  is  news  indeed,"  said  he. 


130  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

"I  married  shortly  after  my  arrival  in  Aus- 
tralia, Miss  Thurston  was  her  name.  I  met  her 
in  society.     It  was  a  most  unhappy  match." 

Some  painful  emotion  possessed  him.  His 
quick,  expressive  features  quivered,  and  his  white 
hands  tightened  upon  the  arms  of  the  chair.  The 
Professor  turned  away  towards  the  window. 

"  You  are  the  best  judge,"  he  remarked  ;  "but 
I  should  not  think  that  it  was  necessary  to  go 
into  details." 

"You  have  a  right  to  know  everything — you 
and  Miss  Grey.  It  is  not  a  matter  on  which  I  can 
well  speak  to  her  direct.  Poor  Jinny  was  the 
best  of  women,  but  she  was  open  to  flattery,  and 
liable  to  be  misled  by  designing  persons.  She 
was  untrue  to  me.  Grey.  It  is  a  hard  thing  to  say 
of  the  dead,  but  she  was  untrue  to  me.  She  fled 
to  Auckland  with  a  man  whom  she  had  known 
before  her  marriage.  The  brig  which  carried 
them  foundered,  and  not  a  soul  was  saved." 

"This  is  very  painful,  O'Brien,"  said  the  Pro- 
fessor, with  a  deprecatory  motion  of  his  hand. 
"I  cannot  see,  however,  how  it  affects  your  rela- 
tion to  my  sister." 

"I  have  eased  my  conscience,"  said  O'Brien, 
rising  from  his  chair;  "I  have  told  you  all  that 
there  is  to  tell.  I  should  not  like  the  story  to 
reach  you  through  any  lips  but  my  own." 

"You  are  right,   O'Brien.    Your  action  has 


A   PHYSIOLOGIST'S   WIFE.  131 

been  most  honourable  and  considerate.  But  you 
are  not  to  blame  in  the  matter,  save  that  perhaps 
you  showed  a  little  precipitancy  in  choosing  a 
life-partner  without  due  care  and  inquiry." 

O'Brien  drew  his  hand  across  his  eyes. 

"Poor  girl!"  he  cried.  "God  help  me,  I 
love  her  still !     But  I  must  go. " 

"  You  will  lunch  with  us  ?  " 

"No,  Professor;  I  have  my  packing  still  to 
do.  I  have  already  bade  Miss  Grey  adieu.  In 
two  months  I  shall  see  you  again." 

"  You  will  probably  find  me  a  married  man." 

"Married!" 

"Yes,  I  have  been  thinking  of  it." 

"My  dear  Professor,  let  me  congratulate  you 
with  all  my  heart.  I  had  no  idea.  Who  is  the 
lady?" 

"  Mrs.  0' James  is  her  name — a  widow  of  the 
same  nationality  as  yourself.  But  to  return  to 
matters  of  importance,  I  should  be  very  happy  to 
see  the  proofs  of  your  paper  upon  the  vermiform 
appendix.  I  may  be  able  to  furnish  you  with 
material  for  a  footnote  or  two." 

"Your  assistance  will  be  invaluable  to  me," 
said  O'Brien,  with  enthusiasm,  and  the  two  men 
parted  in  the  hall.  The  Professor  walked  back 
into  the  dining-room,  where  his  sister  was  already 
seated  at  the  luncheon-table. 

"I  shall  be  married  at  the  registrar's,"  he  re- 


132  EOUND  THE  RED  LAMP, 

marked;  "I  sliould  strongly  recommend  you  to 
do  the  same," 

Professor  Ainslie  Grey  was  as  good  as  his 
word.  A  fortnight's  cessation  of  his  classes  gave 
him  an  opportunity  which  was  too  good  to  let 
pass.  Mrs.  O' James  was  an  orphan,  without  rela- 
tions and  almost  without  friends  in  the  country. 
There  was  no  obstacle  in  the  way  of  a  speedy 
wedding.  They  were  married,  accordingly,  in  the 
quietest  manner  possible,  and  went  off  to  Cam- 
bridge together,  where  the  Professor  and  his 
charming  wife  were  present  at  several  academic 
observances,  and  varied  the  routine  of  their 
honeymoon  by  incursions  into  biological  labora- 
tories and  medical  libraries.  Scientific  friends 
were  loud  in  their  congratulations,  not  only  upon 
Mrs.  Grey's  beauty,  but  upon  the  unusual  quick- 
ness and  intelligence  which  she  displayed  in  dis- 
cussing physiological  questions.  The  Professor 
was  himself  astonished  at  the  accuracy  of  her  in- 
formation. "You  have  a  remarkable  range  of 
knowledge  for  a  woman,  Jeannette,"  he  remarked 
upon  more  than  one  occasion.  He  was  even  pre- 
pared to  admit  that  her  cerebrum  might  be  of  the 
normal  weight. 

One  foggy,  drizzling  morning  they  returned  to 
Birchespool,  for  the  next  day  would  re-open  the 
session,  and  Professor  Ainslie  Grey  prided  him- 
self upon  having  never  once  in  his  life  failed  to 


A  PHYSIOLOGIST'S   WIFE.  133 

appear  in  his  lecture-room  at  the  very  stroke  of 
the  hour.  Miss  Ada  Grey  welcomed  them  with  a 
constrained  cordiality,  and  handed  over  the  keys 
of  office  to  the  new  mistress.  Mrs.  Grey  pressed 
her  warmly  to  remain,  but  she  explained  that  she 
had  already  accepted  an  invitation  which  would 
engage  her  for  some  months.  The  same  evening 
she  departed  for  the  south  of  England. 

A  couple  of  days  later  the  maid  carried  a  card 
just  after  breakfast  into  the  library  where  the 
Professor  sat  revising  his  morning  lecture.  It 
announced  the  re-arrival  of  Dr.  James  M'Murdo 
O'Brien.  Their  meeting  was  effusively  genial  on 
the  part  of  the  younger  man,  and  coldly  precise 
on  that  of  his  former  teacher. 

"You  see  there  have  been  changes,"  said  the 
Professor.  • 

"  So  I  heard.  Miss  Grey  told  me  in  her  letters, 
and  I  read  the  notice  in  the  British  Medical  Jour- 
nal. So  it's  really  married  you  are.  How  quickly 
and  quietly  you  have  managed  it  all !  " 

"I  am  constitutionally  averse  to  anything  in 
the  nature  of  show  or  ceremony.  My  wife  is  a 
sensible  woman — I  may  even  go  the  length  of  say- 
ing that,  for  a  woman,  she  is  abnormally  sensible. 
She  quite  agreed  with  me  in  the  course  which  I 
have  adopted." 

"  And  your  research  on  Vallisneria  ? " 

"This  matrimonial  incident  has  interrupted  it, 


134  PtOUND   THE  RED   LAMP. 

but  I  have  resumed  my  classes,  and  we  shall  soon 
be  quite  in  harness  again." 

"  I  must  see  Miss  Grey  before  I  leave  England. 
We  have  corresponded,  and  I  think  that  all  will 
be  well.  She  must  come  out  with  me.  I  don't 
think  I  could  go  without  her." 

The  Professor  shook  his  head. 

"Your  nature  is  not  so  weak  as  you  pretend," 
he  said.  "Questions  of  this  sort  are,  after  all, 
quite  subordinate  to  the  great  duties  of  life." 

O'Brien  smiled. 

"  You  would  have  me  take  out  my  Celtic  soul 
and  put  in  a  Saxon  one,"  he  said.  "Either  my 
braitf  is  too  small  or  my  heart  is  too  big.  But 
when  may  I  call  and  pay  my  respects  to  Mrs. 
Grey  ?    Will  she  be  at  home  this  afternoon  ? " 

"She  is  at  home  now.  Come  into  the  morn- 
ing-room. She  will  be  glad  to  make  your  ac- 
quaintance. " 

They  walked  across  the  linoleum-paved  hall. 
The  Professor  opened  the  door  of  the  room,  and 
walked  in,  followed  by  his  friend.  Mrs.  Grey  was 
sitting  in  a  basket- chair  by  the  window,  light  and 
fairy-like  in  a  loose-flowing,  pink  morning-gown. 
Seeing  a  visitor,  she  rose  and  swept  towards  them. 
The  Professor  heard  a  dull  thud  behind  him. 
O'Brien  had  fallen  back  into  a  chair,  with  his 
hand  pressed  tight  to  his  side. 

"  Jinny  !  "  he  gasped—"  Jinny  !  " 


A  PHYSIOLOGIST'S  WIFE.  I35 

Mrs.  Grey  stopped  dead  in  lier  advance,  and 
stared  at  him  with  a  face  from  which  every  ex- 
pression had  been  struck  out,  save  one  of  aston- 
ishment and  horror.  Then  with  a  sharp  intaking 
of  the  breath  she  reeled,  and  would  have  fallen 
had  the  Professor  not  thrown  his  long,  nervous 
arm  round  her. 

"Try  this  sofa,"  said  he. 

She  sank  back  among  the  cushions  with 
the  same  white,  cold,  dead  look  upon  her 
face.  The  Professor  stood  with  his  back  to  the 
empty  fireplace  and  glanced  from  the  one  to  the 
other. 

"So,  O'Brien,"  he  said  at  last,  "you  have 
already  made  the  acquaintance  of  my  wife  !  " 

"  Your  wife,"  cried  his  friend  hoarsely.  "  She 
is  no  wife  of  yours.  God  help  me,  she  is  my 
wife." 

The  Professor  stood  rigidly  upon  the  hearth- 
rug. His  long,  thin  fingers  were  intertwined,  and 
his  head  sunk  a  little  forward.  His  two  com- 
panions had  eyes  only  for  each  other. 

"Jinny !"  said  he. 

"James!" 

"How  could  you  leave  me  so.  Jinny?  How 
could  you  have  the  heart  to  do  it  ?  I  thought  you 
were  dead.  I  mourned  for  your  death— ay,  and 
you  have  made  me  mourn  for  you  living.  You 
have  withered  my  life." 


136  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

She  made  no  answer,  but  lay  back  among  her 
cushions  with  her  eyes  still  fixed  upon  him. 

"  Why  do  you  not  speak  ?  " 

"  Because  you  are  right,  James.  I  have  treated 
you  cruelly— shamefully.  But  it  is  not  as  bad  as 
you  think." 

"You  fled  with  De  Horta." 

"  No,  I  did  not.  At  the  last  moment  my  better 
nature  prevailed.  He  went  alone.  But  I  was 
ashamed  to  come  back  after  what  I  had  written  to 
you.  I  could  not  face  you.  I  took  passage  alone 
to  England  under  a  new  name,  and  here  I  have 
lived  ever  since.  It  seemed  to  me  that  I  was  be- 
ginning life  again.  I  knew  that  you  thought  I 
was  drowned.  Who  could  have  dreamed  that 
fate  would  throw  us  together  again  !  When  the 
Professor  asked  me " 

She  stopped  and  gave  a  gasp  for  breath. 

"You  are  faint,"  said  the  Professor — "keep 
the  head  low ;  it  aids  the  cerebral  circulation." 
He  flattened  down  the  cushion.  "  I  am  sorry  to 
leave  you,  O'Brien  ;  but  I  have  my  class  duties  to 
look  to.  Possibly  I  may  find  you  here  when  I 
return." 

With  a  grim  and  rigid  face  he  strode  out 
of  the  room.  Not  one  of  the  three  hundred 
students  who  listened  to  his  lecture  saw  any 
change  in  his  manner  and  appearance,  or  could 
have  guessed  that  the  austere  gentleman  in  front 


A   PHYSIOLOGIST'S  WIFE.  137 

of  them  had  found  out  at  last  how  hard  it  is  to 
rise  above  one's  humanity.  The  lecture  over,  he 
performed  his  routine  duties  in  the  laboratory, 
and  then  drove  back  to  his  own  house.  He  did 
not  enter  by  the  front  door,  but  passed  through 
the  garden  to  the  folding  glass  casement  which  led 
out  of  the  morning-room.  As  he  approached  he 
heard  his  wife's  voice  and  O'Brien's  in  loud  and 
animated  talk.  He  paused  among  the  rose-bushes, 
uncertain  whether  to  interrupt  them  or  no.  Noth- 
ing was  further  from  his  nature  than  play  the 
eavesdropper ;  but  as  he  stood,  still  hesitating, 
words  fell  upon  his  ear  which  struck  him  rigid 
and  motionless. 

"  You  are  still  my  wife.  Jinny,"  said  O'Brien  ; 
"I  forgive  you  from  the  bottom  of  my  heart.  I 
love  you,  and  I  have  never  ceased  to  love  you, 
though  you  had  forgotten  me." 

"No,  James,  my  heart  was  always  in  Mel- 
bourne. I  have  always  been  yours.  I  thought 
that  it  was  better  for  you  that  I  should  seem  to  be 
dead." 

"  You  must  choose  between  us  now,  Jinny. 
If  you  determine  to  remain  here,  I  shall  not  open 
my  lips.  There  shall  be  no  scandal.  If,  on  the 
other  hand,  you  come  with  me,  it's  little  I  care 
about  the  world's  opinion.  Perhaps  I  am  as  much 
to  blame  as  you.  I  thought  too  much  of  my  work 
and  too  little  of  my  wife." 

10 


13S  ROUXD   THE   RED   LAMP. 

The  Professor  heard  the  cooing,  caressing 
laugh  which  he  knew  so  well. 

''I  shall  go  with  you.  James,"  she  said. 

"And  the  Professor '( " 

"The  poor  Professor !  But  he  will  not  mind 
much,  James  ;  he  has  no  heart." 

"  TTe  must  tell  him  our  resolution." 

"There  is  no  need,"  said  Professor  Ainslie 
Grev.  stepping  in  through  the  open  casement. 
'*I  have  overheard  the  latter  part  of  your  con- 
versation. I  hesitated  to  interrupt  you  before 
you  came  to  a  conclusion." 

O'Brien  stretched  out  his  hand  and  took 
that  of  the  woman.  They  stood  together  with 
the  sunshine  on  their  faces.  The  Professor 
paused  at  the  casement  with  his  hands  behind 
his  back,  and  his  long  black  shadow  fell  between 
them. 

"You  have  come  to  a  wise  decision,"  said  he. 
"Go  back  to  Australia  together,, and  let  what  has 
passed  be  blotted  out  of  your  lives." 

"  But  you — you "  stammered  O'Brien. 

The  Professor  waved  his  hand. 

"  Xever  trouble  about  me."  he  said. 

The  woman  gave  a  gasping  cry. 

"  What  can  I  do  or  say  i "  she  wailed.  "  How 
could  I  have  foreseen  this  i  I  thought  my  old 
life  was  dead.  But  it  has  come  back  again,  with 
all  its  hopes  and  its  desires.     TVliat  can  I  say  to 


A    PIIVSIOLOGIST-S    WIFR.  139 

yoii,  Ainslie  ?  I  have  brought  shame  and  dis- 
grace upon  a  worthy  man.  I  have  blasted  your 
life.  How  you  must  hate  and  loathe  me  !  I  wish 
to  God  that  I  had  never  been  born  !  " 

"  I  neither  hate  nor  loathe  you,  Jeannette," 
said  the  Professor,  quietly,  "You  are  wrong  in 
regretting  your  birth,  for  you  have  a  worthy  mis- 
sion before  you  in  aiding  the  life-work  of  a  man 
who  has  shown  himself  capable  of  the  highest 
order  of  scientific  research.  I  cannot  with  justice 
blame  you  personally  for  what  has  occurred. 
How  far  the  individual  monad  is  to  be  held  re- 
sponsible for  hereditary  and  engrained  tendencies, 
is  a  question  upon  which  science  has  not  yet  said 
her  last  word." 

lie  stood  with  his  finger-tips  touching,  and 
his  body  inclined  as  -one  who  is  gravely  ex- 
pounding a  difiicult  and  impersonal  subject. 
O'Brien  had  stepped  forward  to  say  something, 
but  the  other's  attitude  and  manner  froze  the 
words  upon  his  lips.  Condolence  or  sympathy 
would  be  an  impertinence  to  one  who  could  so 
easily  merge  his  private  griefs  in  broad  questions 
of  abstract  philosoph3^ 

"It  is  needless  to  prolong  the  situation,"  the 
Professor  continued,  in  the  same  measured  tones. 
"My  brougham  stands  at  the  door.  I  beg  that 
you  will  use  it  as  your  own.  Perhaps  it  would  be 
as  well  that  you  should  leave  the  town  without 


140  ROUND   THE   RED   LAMP. 

unnecessary  delay.  Your  things,  Jeannette,'  shall 
be  forwarded." 

O'Brien  hesitated  with  a  hanging  head. 

"  I  hardly  dare  offer  you  my  hand,"  he  said. 

"On  the  contrary.  I  think  that  of  the  three 
of  us  you  come  best  out  of  the  aft'air.  You  have 
nothing  to  be  ashamed  of." 

"  Your  sister " 

"  I  shall  see  that  the  matter  is  put  to  her  in  its 
true  light.  Good-bye !  Let  me  have  a  copy  of 
your  recent  research.     Good-bye,  Jeannette  !  " 

"Good-bye!" 

Their  hands  met,  and  for  one  short  moment 
their  eyes  also.  It  was  only  a  glance,  but  for  the 
first  and  last  time  the  woman's  intuition  cast  a 
light  for  itself  into  the  dark  i)laces  of  a  strong 
man's  soul.  She  gave  a  little  gasp,  and  her  other 
hand  rested  for  an  instant,  as  white  and  as  light 
as  thistle-down,  upon  his  shoulder. 

"James,  James  !  "  she  cried.  ,"  Don't  you  see 
that  he  is  stricken  to  the  heart  ? " 

He  turned  her  quietly  away  from  him. 

"I  am  not  an  emotional  man,"  he  said.  "I 
have  my  duties— my  research  on  Yallisneria.  The 
brougham  is  there.  Your  cloak  is  in  the  hall. 
Tell  John  where  you  wish  to  be  driven.  He  will 
bring  you  anything  you  need.     Now  go." 

His  last  two  words  were  so  sudden,  so  volcanic, 
in  such  contrast  to  his  measured  voice  and  mask- 


A  PHYSIOLOGIST'S  WIFE.  141 

like  face,  that  they  swept  the  two  away  from  him. 
He  closed  the  door  behind  them  and  paced  slowly 
up  and  down  the  room.  Then  he  passed  into  the 
library  and  looked  out  over  the  wire  blind.  The 
carriage  was  rolling  away.  He  caught  a  last 
glimpse  of  the  woman  who  had  been  his  wife. 
He  saw  the  feminine  droop  of  her  head,  and  the 
curve  of  her  beautiful  throat. 

Under  some  foolish,  aimless  impulse,  he  took 
a  few  quick  steps  towards  the  door.  Then  he 
turned,  and  throwing  himself  into  his  study- chair 
he  plunged  back  into  his  work. 


There  was  little  scandal  about  this  singular 
domestic  incident.  The  Professor  had  few  per- 
sonal friends,  and  seldom  went  into  society.  His 
marriage  had  been  so  quiet  that  most  of  his  col- 
leagues had  never  ceased  to  regard  him  as  a  bach- 
elor. Mrs.  Esdaile  and  a  few  others  might  talk, 
but  their  field  for  gossip  was  limited,  for  they 
could  only  guess  vaguely  at  the  cause  of  this  sud- 
den separation. 

The  Professor  was  as  punctual  as  ever  at  his 
classes,  and  as  zealous  in  directing  the  laboratory 
work  of  those  who  studied  under  him.  His  own 
private  researches  were  pushed  on  with  feverish 
energy.  It  was  no  uncommon  thing  for  his  serv- 
ants, when  they  came  down  of  a  morning,  to  hear 


142  ROUXD  THE   RED   LAMP. 

the  shrill  scratchings  of  his  tireless  pen,  or  to 
meet  him  on  the  staircase  as  he  ascended,  grey 
and  silent,  to  his  room.  In  vain  his  friends  as- 
sured him  that  such  a  life  must  undermine  his 
health.  He  lengthened  his  hours  until  day  and 
night  were  one  long,  ceaseless  task. 

Gradually  under  this  discipline  a  change  came 
over  his  appearance.  His  features,  always  in- 
clined to  gauntness,  became  even  sharper  and 
more  pronounced.  There  were  deep  lines  about 
his  temples  and  across  his  brow.  His  cheek  was 
sunken  and  his  complexion  bloodless.  His  knees 
gave  under  him  when  he  walked  ;  and  once  when 
passing  out  of  his  lecture-room  he  fell  and  had 
to  be  assisted  to  his  carriage. 

This  was  just  before  the  end  of  the  session  ; 
and  soon  after  the  holidays  commenced  the  pro- 
fessors who  still  remained  in  Birchespool  were 
shocked  to  hear  that  their  brother  of  the  chair  of 
physiology  had  sunk  so  low  that  no  hopes  could 
be  entertained  of  his  recovery.  Two  eminent 
physicians  had  consulted  over  his  case  without 
being  able  to  give  a  nam^  to  the  aJffection  from 
which  he  suffered.  A  steadily  decreasing  vitality 
appeared  to  be  the  only  symptom— a  bodily  weak- 
ness which  left  the  mind  unclouded.  He  was 
much  interested  himself  in  his  own  case,  and 
made  notes  of  his  subjective  sensations  as  an  aid 
to  diagnosis.     Of  his  approaching  end  he  spoke 


A  PHYSIOLOGIST'S  WIFE.  143 

in  his  usual  unemotional  and  somewhat  pedantic 
fashion.  "It  is  the  assertion,"  he  said,  "of  the 
liberty  of  the  individual  cell  as  opposed  to  the 
cell-commune.  It  is  the  dissolution  of  a  co-oper- 
ative society.  The  process  is  one  of  great  inter- 
est." 

And  so  one  grey  morning  his  co-operative  so- 
ciety dissolved.  Very  quietly  and  softly  he  sank 
into  his  eternal  sleep.  His  two  physicians  felt 
some  slight  embarrassment  when  called  upon  to 
fill  in  his  certificate. 

"  It  is  difficult  to  give  it  a  name,"  said  one. 

"Very,"  said  the  other. 

"If  he  were  not  such  an  unemotional  man,  I 
should  have  said  that  he  had  died  from  some  sud- 
den nervous  shock— from,  in  fact,  what  the  vul- 
gar would  call  a  broken  heart." 

"  I  don't  think  poor  Grey  was  that  sort  of  a 
man  at  all." 

"Let  us  call  it  cardiac,  anyhow,"  said  the 
older  physician. 

So  they  did  so. 


THE  CASE  OF  LADY  SANNOX. 

The  relations  between  Douglas  Stone  and  the 
notorious  Lady  Sannox  were  very  well  known 
both  among  the  fashionable  circles  of  which  she 
was  a  brilliant  member,  and  the  scientific  bodies 
which  numbered  him  among  their  most  illustrious 
confreres.  There  was  naturally,  therefore,  a  very 
widespread  interest  when  it  was  announced  one 
morning  that  the  lady  had  absolutely  and  for 
ever  taken  the  veil,  and  that  the  world  would  see 
her  no  more.  When,  at  the  very  tail  of  this 
rumour,  there  came  the  assurance  that  the  cele- 
brated operating  surgeon,  the  man  of  steel 
nerves,  had  been  found  in  the  morning  by  his 
valet,  seated  on  one  side  of  his  bed,  smiling  pleas- 
antly upon  the  universe,  with  both  legs  jammed 
into  one  side  of  his  breeches  and  his  great  brain 
about  as  valuable  as  a  cap  full  of  porridge,  the 
matter  was  strong  enough  to  give  quite  a  little 
thrill  of  interest  to  folk  who  had  never  hoped 
that  their  jaded  nerves  were  capable  of  such  a 
sensation. 

a44) 


THE  CASE   OP  LADY  SANNOX.  145 

Douglas  Stone  in  bis  prime  was  one  of  the 
most  remarkable  men  in  England.  Indeed,  he 
could  hardly  be  said  to  have  ever  reached  his 
prime,  for  he  was  but  nine-and-thirty  at  the  time 
of  this  little  incident.  Those  who  knew  him  best 
were  aware  that,  famous  as  he  was  as  a  surgeon, 
he  might  have  succeeded  with  even  greater  rapid- 
ity in  any  of  a  dozen  lines  of  life.  He  could  have 
cut  his  way  to  fame  as  a  soldier,  struggled  to  it  as 
an  explorer,  bullied  for  it  in  the  courts,  or  built 
it  out  of  stone  and  iron  as  an  engineer.  He  was 
born  to  be  great,  for  he  could  plan  what  another 
man  dare  not  do,  and  he  could  do  what  another 
man  dare  not  plan.  In  surgery  none  could  follow 
him.  His  nerve,  his  judgment,  his  intuition, 
were  things  apart.  Again  and  again  his  knife  cut 
away  death,  but  grazed  the  very  springs  of  life 
in  doing  it,  until  his  assistants  were  as  white  as 
the  patient.  His  energy,  his  audacity,  his  full- 
blooded  self-confidence— does  not  the  memory  of 
them  still  linger  to  the  south  of  Marylebone  Road 
and  the  north  of  Oxford  Street  ? 

His  vices  were  as  magnificent  as  his  virtues, 
and  infinitely  more  picturesque.  Large  as  was 
his  income,  and  it  was  the  third  largest  of  all  pro- 
fessional men  in  London,  it  was  far  beneath  the 
luxury  of  his  living.  Deep  in  his  complex  na- 
ture lay  a  rich  vein  of  sensualism,  at  the  sport  of 
which  he  placed  all  the  prizes  of  his  life.     The 


146  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

eye,  the  ear,  the  touch,  the  palate — all  were  his 
masters.  The  bouquet  of  old  vintages,  the  scent 
of  rare  exotics,  the  curves  and  tints  of  the  dainti- 
est potteries  of  Europe— it  was  to  these  that  the 
quick-running  stream  of  gold  was  transformed. 
And  then  there  came  his  sudden  mad  passion  for 
Lady  Sannox,  when  a  single  interview  with  two 
challenging  glances  and  a  whispered  word  set  him 
ablaze.  She  was  the  loveliest  w^oman  in  London, 
and  the  only  one  to  him.  He  was  one  of  the  hand- 
somest men  in  London,  but  not  the  only  one  to  her. 
She  had  a  liking  for  new  experiences,  and  was  gra- 
cious to  most  men  who  wooed  her.  It  may  have 
been  cause  or  it  may  have  been  effect  that  Lord  San- 
nox looked  fifty,  though  he  was  but  six- and- thirty. 
He  was  a  quiet,  silent,  neutral-tinted  man,  this 
lord,  with  thin  lips  and  heavy  eyelids,  much 
given  to  gardening,  and  full  of  home-like  habits. 
He  had  at  one  time  been  fond  of  acting,  had  even 
rented  a  theatre  in  London,  and  on  its  boards  had 
first  seen  Miss  Marion  Dawson,  to  whom  he  had 
offered  his  hand,  his  title,  and  the  third  of  a 
county.  Since  his  marriage  this  early  hobby 
had  become  distasteful  to  him.  Even  in  private 
theatricals  it  was  no  longer  possible  to  persuade 
him  to  exercise  the  talent  which  he  had  often 
shown  that  he  possessed.  He  was  happier  with  a 
spud  and  a  w^atering-can  among  his  orchids  and 
chrysanthemums. 


THE  CASE  OP  LADY   SANNOX.  I47 

It  was  quite  an  interesting  problem  whether 
he  was  absolutely  devoid  of  sense,  or  miserably 
wanting  in  spirit.  Did  he  know  his  lady's  ways 
and  condone  them,  or  was  he  a  mere  blind,  dot- 
ing fool  ?  It  was  a  point  to  be  discussed  over  the 
teacups  in  snug  little  drawing-rooms,  or  with  the 
aid  of  a  cigar  in  the  bow  windows  of  clubs.  Bit- 
ter and  plain  were  the  comments  among  men 
upon  his  conduct.  There  was  but  one  who  had 
a  good  word  to  say  for  him,  and  he  was  the  most 
silent  member  in  the  smoking-room.  He  had 
seen  him  break  in  a  horse  at  the  university,  and 
it  seemed  to  have  left  an  impression  upon  his  mind. 

But  when  Douglas  Stone  became  the  favourite, 
all  doubts  as  to  Lord  Sannox's  knowledge  or  ig- 
norance were  set  for  ever  at  rest.  There  was  no 
subterfuge  about  Stone.  In  his  high-handed,  im- 
petuous fashion,  he  set  all  caution  and  discretion 
at  defiance.  The  scandal  became  notorious.  A 
learned  body  intimated  that  his  name  had  been 
struck  from  the  list  of  its  vice-presidents.  Two 
friends  implored  him  to  consider  his  professional 
credit.  He  cursed  them  all  three,  and  spent  forty 
guineas  on  a  bangle  to  take  with  him  to  the  lady. 
He  was  at  her  house  every  evening,  and  she  drove 
in  his  carriage  in  the  afternoons.  There  was  not 
an  attempt  on  either  side  to  conceal  their  rela- 
tions ;  but  there  came  at  last  a  little  incident  to 
interrupt  them. 


148  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

It  was  a  dismal  winter's  night,  very  cold  and 
gusty,  with  the  wind  whooping  in  the  chimneys 
and  blustering  against  the  window-panes.  A  thin 
spatter  of  rain  tinkled  on  the  glass  with  each 
fresh  sough  of  the  gale,  drowning  for  the  instant 
the  dull  gurgle  and  drip  from  the  eves.  Douglas 
Stone  had  finished  his  dinner,  and  sat  by  his  fire 
in  the  study,  a  glass  of  rich  port  upon  the  mala- 
chite table  at  his  elbow.  As  he  raised  it  to  his 
lips,  he  held  it  up  against  the  lamplight,  and 
watched  with  the  eye  of  a  connoisseur  the  tiny 
scales  of  beeswing  which  floated  in  its  rich  ruby 
depths.  The  fire,  as  it  spurted  up,  threw  fit- 
ful lights  upon  his  bold,  clear-cut  face,  with  its 
widely-opened  grey  eyes,  its  thick  and  yet  firm 
lips,  and  the  deep,  square  jaw,  which  had  some- 
thing Eoman  in  its  strength  and  its  animalism. 
He  smiled  from  time  to  time  as  he  nestled  back 
in  his  luxurious  chair.  Indeed,  he  had  a  right 
to  feel  well  pleased,  for,  against  the  advice  of  six 
colleagues,  he  had  performed  an  operation  that 
day  of  which  only  two  cases  were  on  record,  and 
the  result  had  been  brilliant  beyond  all  expecta- 
tion. No  other  man  in  London  would  have  had 
the  daring  to  plan,  or  the  skill  to  execute,  such  a 
heroic  measure. 

But  he  had  promised  Lady  Sannox  to  see  her 
that  evening  and  it  was  already  half-past  eight. 
His  hand  was  outstretched  to  the  bell  to  order 


THE  CASE  OP  LADY   SANNOX.  I49 

the  carriage  when  he  heard  the  dull  thud  of  the 
knocker.  An  instant  later  there  was  the  shuffling 
of  feet  in  the  hall,  and  the  sharp  closing  of  a  door. 

"A  patient  to  see  you,  sir,  in  the  consulting- 
room,"  said  the  butler. 

"About  himself?" 

"No,  sir  ;  I  think  he  wants  you  to  go  out." 

"  It  is  too  late,"  cried  Douglas  Stone  peevishly. 
"I  won't  go." 

"This  is  his  card,  sir." 

The  butler  presented  it  upon  the  gold  salver 
which  had  been  given  to  his  master  by  the  wife 
of  a  Prime  Minister. 

"  '  Hamil  Ali,  Smyrna.'  Hum  !  The  fellow 'is 
a  Turk,  I  suppose." 

"Yes,  sir.  He  seems  as  if  he  came  from 
abroad,  sir.     And  he's  in  a  terrible  w^ay." 

"Tut,  tut!  I  have  an  engagement.  I  must  go 
somewhere  else.  But  I'll  see  him.  Show  him  in 
here,  Pim." 

A  few  moments  later  the  butler  swung  open 
the  door  and  ushered  in  a  small  and  decrepit 
man,  who  walked  with  a  bent  back  and  with  the 
forward  push  of  the  face  and  blink  of  the  eyes 
which  goes  with  extreme  short  sight.  His  face 
w^as  swarthy,  and  his  hair  and  beard  of  the  deep- 
est black.  In  one  hand  he  held  a  turban  of  white 
muslin  striped  with  red,  in  the  other  a  small 
chamois  leather  bag. 


150  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

"  Good-evening,"  said  Douglas  Stone,  when  the 
butler  had  closed  the  door.  "  You  speak  English, 
I  presume  ? " 

"Yes,  sir.  I  am  from  Asia  Minor,  but  I  speak 
English  when  I  speak  slow." 

"  You  wanted  me  to  go  out,  I  understand  ? " 

"Yes,  sir.  I  wanted  very  much  that  you 
should  see  my  wife." 

"I  could  come  in  the  morning,  but  I  have  an 
engagement  which  prevents  me  from  seeing  your 
wife  to-night." 

The  Turk's  answer  was  a  singular  one.  He 
pulled  the  string  which  closed  the  mouth  of  the 
chamois  leather  bag,  and  poured  a  flood  of  gold 
on  to  the  table. 

"There  are  one  hundred  pounds  there,"  said 
he,  "and  I  promise  you  that  it  will  not  take  you 
an  hour.     I  have  a  cab  ready  at  the  door." 

Douglas  Stone  glanced  at  his  watch.  An  hour 
would  not  make  it  too  late  to  visit  Lady  Sannox. 
He  had  been  there  later.  And  the  fee  was  an  ex- 
traordinarily high  one.  He  had  been  pressed  by 
his  creditors  lately,  and  he  could  not  afford  to  let 
§uch  a  chance  pass.     He  would  go. 

"What  is  the  case  ? "  he  asked. 

"  Oh,  it  is  so  sad  a  one  !  So  sad  a  one  !  You 
have  not,  perhaps,  heard  of  the  daggers  of  the 
Almohades  ? " 

"Never." 


THE  CASE  OF   LADY  SANNOX.  151 

"Ah,  they  are  Eastern  daggers  of  a  great  age 
and  of  a  singular  shape,  with  the  hilt  like  what 
you  call  a  stirrup.  I  am  a  curiosity  dealer,  you 
understand,  and  that  is  why  I  have  come  to  Eng- 
land from  Smyrna,  but  next  week  I  go  back  once 
more.  Many  things  I  brought  with  me,  and  I 
have  a  few  things  left,  but  among  them,  to  my 
sorrow,  is  one  of  these  daggers." 

"  You  will  remember  that  I  have  an  appoint- 
ment, sir,"  said  the  surgeon,  with  some  irrita- 
tion. "Pray  confine  yourself  to  the  necessary 
details." 

"  You  will  see  that  it  is  necessary.  To-day  my 
wife  fell  down  in  a  faint  in  the  room  in  which  I 
keep  my  wares,  and  she  cut  her  lower  lip  upon 
this  cursed  dagger  of  Almohades." 

"I  see,"  said  Douglas  Stone,  rising.  "And 
you  wish  me  to  dress  the  wound  ? " 

"  No,  no,  it  is  worse  than  that." 

"What  then?" 

"  These  daggers  are  poisoned." 

"Poisoned!" 

"Yes,  and  there  is  no  man.  East  or  West,  who 
can  tell  now  what  is  the  poison  or  what  the  cure. 
But  all  that  is  known  I  know,  for  my  father  was 
in  this  trade  before  me,  and  we  have  had  much  to 
do  with  these  poisoned  weapons." 

"  What  are  the  symptoms  ? " 

"Deep  sleep,  and  death  in  thirty  hours." 


152  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

"And  you  say  there  is  no  cure.  Why  then 
should  you  pay  me  this  considerable  fee  ? " 

"  No  drug  can  cure,  but  the  knife  may." 

"And  how?" 

"  The  poison  is  slow  of  absorption.  It  remains 
for  hours  in  the  wound." 

"  Washing,  then,  might  cleanse  it  ? " 

"No  more  than  in  a  snake-bite.  It  is  too 
subtle  and  too  deadly." 

"  Excision  of  the  wound,  then  ?  " 

"That  is  it.  If  it  be  on  the  finger,  take  the 
finger  off.  So  said  my  father  always.  But  think 
of  where  this  wound  is,  and  that  it  is  my  wife.  It 
is  dreadful ! " 

But  familiarity  with  such  grim  matters  may 
take  the  finer  edge  from  a  man's  sympathy.  To 
Douglas  Stone  this  was  already  an  interesting 
case,  and  he  brushed  aside  as  irrelevant  the  feeble 
objections  of  the  husband. 

"It  appears  to  be  that  or  nothing,"  said  he 
brusquely.  "It  is  better  to  lose  a  lip  than  a 
life." 

"Ah,  yes,  I  know  that  you  are  right.  Well, 
well,  it  is  kismet,  and  must  be  faced.  I  have 
the  cab,  and  you  will  come  with  me  and  do  this 
thing." 

Douglas  Stone  took  his  case  of  bistouries  from 
a  drawer,  and  placed  it  with  a  roll  of  bandage 
and  a  compress  of  lint  in  his  pocket.     He  must 


THE  CASE  OP  LADY  SANNOX.  I53 

waste  no  more  time  if  lie  were  to  see  Lady 
Sannox. 

"I  am  ready,"  said  he,  pulling  on  his  overcoat. 
*'  Will  you  take  a  glass  of  wine  before  you  go  out 
into  this  cold  air  ? " 

His  visitor  shrank  away,  with  a  protesting 
hand  upraised. 

"You  forget  that  I  am  a  Mussulman,  and  a 
true  follower  of  the  Prophet,"  said  he.  "  But  tell 
me  what  is  the  bottle  of  green  glass  which  you 
have  placed  in  your  pocket  ? " 

"It  is  chloroform." 

"Ah,  that  also  is  forbidden  to  us.  It  is  a 
spirit,  and  we  make  no  use  of  such  things." 

"  What !  You  would  allow  your  wife  to  go 
through  an  operation  without  an  anjesthetic  ? " 

"Ah!  she  will  feel  nothing,  poor  soul.  The 
deep  sleep  has  already  come  on,  which  is  the  first 
working  of  the  poison.  And  then  I  have  given 
her  of  our  Smyrna  opium.  Come,  sir,  for  already 
an  hour  has  passed." 

As  they  stepped  out  into  the  darkness,  a  sheet 
of  rain  was  driven  in  upon  their  faces,  and  the 
hall  lamp,  which  dangled  from  the  arm  of  a 
marble  caryatid,  went  out  with  a  fluff.  Pim,  the 
butler,  pushed  the  heavy  door  to,  straining  hard 
with  his  shoulder  against  the  wind,  while  the 
two  men  groped  their  way  towards  the  yellow 
glare  which  showed  where  the  cab  was  waiting. 


154:  ROUND   THE  RED   LAMP. 

An  instant  later  they  were  rattling  upon  their 
journey. 

"  Is  it  far  ?  "  asked  Douglas  Stone. 

"  Oh,  no.  We  have  a  very  little  quiet  place 
off  the  Euston  Eoad." 

The  surgeon  pressed  the  spring  of  his  repeater 
and  listened  to  the  little  tings  which  told  him  the 
hour.  It  was  a  quarter  past  nine.  He  calculated 
the  distances,  and  the  short  time  which  it  would 
take  him  to  perform  so  trivial  an  operation.  He 
ought  to  reach  Lady  Sannox  by  ten  o'clock. 
Through  the  fogged  windows  he  saw  the  blurred 
gas-lamps  dancing  past,  with  occasionally  the 
broader  glare  of  a  shop  front.  The  rain  was  pelt- 
ing and  rattling  upon  the  leathern  top  of  the  car- 
riage, and  the  wheels  swashed  as  they  rolled 
through  puddle  and  mud.  Opposite  to  him  the 
white  headgear  of  his  companion  gleamed  faintly 
through  the  obscurity.  The  surgeon  felt  in  his 
pockets  and  arranged  his  needles,  his  ligatures 
and  his  safety-pins,  that  no  time  might  be  wasted 
when  they  arrived.  He  chafed  with  impatience 
and  drummed  his  foot  upon  the  floor. 

But  the  cab  slowed  down  at  last  and  pulled  up. 
In  an  instant  Douglas  Stone  was  out,  and  the 
Smyrna  merchant's  toe  was  at  his  very  heel. 

"  You  can  wait,"  said  he  to  the  driver. 

It  was  a  mean-looking  house  in  a  narrow  and 
sordid  street.    The  surgeon,  who  knew  his  London 


THE   CASE   OP   LADY  SANNOX.  I55 

well,  cast  a  swift  glance  into  the  shadows,  but 
there  was  nothing  distinctive — no  shop,  no  move- 
ment, nothing  but  a  double  line  of  dull,  flat-faced 
houses,  a  double  stretch  of  wet  flagstones  which 
gleamed  in  the  lamplight,  and  a  double  rush  of 
water  in  the  gutters  which  swirled  and  gurgled 
towards  the  sewer  gratings.  The  door  which 
faced  them  was  blotched  and  discoloured,  and  a 
faint  light  in  the  fan  pane  above  it  served  to  show 
the  dust  and  the  grime  which  covered  it.  Above, 
in  one  of  the  bedroom  windows,  there  was  a  dull 
yellow  glimmer.  The  merchant  knocked  loudly, 
and,  as  he  turned  his  dark  face  towards  the  light, 
Douglas  Stone  could  see  that  it  was  contracted 
with  anxiety.  A  bolt  was  drawn,  and  an  elderly 
woman  with  a  taper  stood  in  the  doorway,  shield- 
ing the  thin  flame  with  her  gnarled  hand. 

"  Is  all  well  ?  "  gasped  the  merchant. 

"  She  is  as  you  left  her,  sir." 

"  She  has  not  spoken  ? " 

"  No  ;  she  is  in  a  deep  sleep." 

The  merchant  closed  the  door,  and  Douglas 
Stone  walked  down  the  narrow  passage,  glancing 
about  him  in  some  surprise  as  he  did  so.  There 
was  no  oilcloth,  no  mat,  no  hat-rack.  Deep  grey 
dust  and  heavy  festoons  of  cobwebs  met  his  eyes 
everywhere.  Following  the  old  woman  up  the 
winding  stair,  his  firm  footfall  echoed  harshly 
through  the  silent  house.     There  was  no  carpet. 


156  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

The  bedroom  was  on  the  second  landing. 
Douglas  Stone  followed  the  old  nurse  into  it,  with 
the  merchant  at  his  heels.  Here,  at  least,  there 
was  furniture  and  to  spare.  The  floor  was  littered 
and  the  corners  piled  with  Turkish  cabinets,  in- 
laid tables,  coats  of  chain  mail,  strange  pipes,  and 
grotesque  weapons.  A  single  small  lamp  stood 
upon  a  bracket  on  the  wall.  Douglas  Stone  took 
it  down,  and  picking  his  way  among  the  lumber, 
walked  over  to  a  couch  in  the  corner,  on  which 
lay  a  woman  dressed  in  the  Turkish  fashion, 
with  yashmak  and  veil.  The  lower  part  of  the 
face  was  exposed,  and  the  surgeon  saw  a  jagged 
cut  which  zigzagged  along  the  border  of  the 
under  lip. 

"You  will  forgive  the  yashmak,"  said  the 
Turk.  "You  know  our  views  about  woman  in 
the  East." 

But  the  surgeon  was  not  thinking  about  the 
yashmak.  This  was  no  longer  a  woman  to  him. 
It  was  a  case.  He  stooped  and  examined  the 
wound  carefully. 

"There  are  no  signs  of  irritation,"  said  he. 
"We  might  delay  the  operation  until  local  symp- 
toms develop." 

The  husband  wrung  his  hands  in  incontrolla- 
ble  agitation. 

"Oh!  sir,  sir!"  he  cried.  "Do  not  trifle. 
You  do  not  know.     It  is  deadly.     I  know,  and  I 


THE  CASE   OF  LADY  SANNOX.  I57 

give  you  my  assurance  that  an  operation  is  abso- 
lutely necessary.     Only  the  knife  can  save  her." 

"And  yet  I  am  inclined  to  wait,"  said  Doug- 
las Stone. 

"That  is  enough!"  the  Turk  cried,  angrily. 
"Every  minute  is  of  importance,  and  I  cannot 
stand  here  and  see  my  wife  allowed  to  sink.  It 
only  remains  for  me  to  give  you  my  thanks  for 
having  come,  and  to  call  in  some  other  surgeon 
before  it  is  too  late." 

Douglas  Stone  hesitated.  To  refund  that  hun- 
dred pounds  was  no  pleasant  matter.  But  of 
course  if  he  left  the  case  he  must  return  the 
money.  And  if  the  Turk  were  right  and  the 
woman  died,  his  position  before  a  coroner  might 
be  an  embarrassing  one. 

"You  have  had  personal  experience  of  this 
poison  ? "  he  asked. 

"I  have." 

"And  you  assure  me  that  an  operation  is 
needful." 

"  I  swear  it  by  all  that  I  hold  sacred." 

"The  disfigurement  will  be  frightful." 

"I  can  understand  that  the  mouth  will  not  be 
a  pretty  one  to  kiss." 

Douglas  Stone  turned  fiercely  upon  the  man. 
The  speech  was  a  brutal  one.  But  the  Turk  has 
his  own  fashion  of  talk  and  of  thought,  and  there 
was  no  time  for  wrangling.    Douglas  Stone  drew 


158  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

a  bistoury  from  his  case,  opened  it  and  felt  the 
keen  straight  edge  with  his  forefinger.  Then  he 
held  the  lamp  closer  to  the  bed.  Two  dark  eyes 
were  gazing  up  at  him  through  the  slit  in  the 
yashmak.  They  were  all  iris,  and  the  pupil  was 
hardly  to  be  seen. 

"You  have  given  her  a  very  heavy  dose  of 
opium." 

"  Yes,  she  has  had  a  good  dose." 

He  glanced  again  at  the  dark  eyes  which 
looked  straight  at  his  own.  They  were  dull  and 
lustreless,  but,  even  as  he  gazed,  a  little  shifting 
sparkle  came  into  them,  and  the  lips  quivered. 

"  She  is  not  absolutely  unconscious,"  said  he. 

"Would  it  not  be  well  to  use  the  knife  while 
it  would  be  painless  ?  " 

The  same  thought  had  crossed  the  surgeon's 
mind.  He  grasped  the  wounded  lip  with  his  for- 
ceps, and  with  two  swift  cuts  he  took  out  a  broad 
V-shaped  piece.  The  woman  sprang  up  on  the 
couch  with  a  dreadful  gurgling  scream.  Her  cov- 
ering was  torn  from  her  face.  It  was  a  face  that 
he  knew.  In  spite  of  that  protruding  upper  lip 
and  that  slobber  of  blood,  it  was  a  face  that  he 
knew.  She  kept  on  putting  her  hand  up  to  the 
gap  and  screaming.  Douglas  Stone  sat  down  at 
the  foot  of  the  couch  with  his  knife  and  his  for- 
ceps. The  room  was  whirling  round,  and  he  had 
felt  something  go  like  a  ripping  seam  behind  his 


THE  CASE   OF  LADY  SANXOX.  159 

ear.  A  bystander  would  have  said  that  his  face 
was  the  more  ghastly  of  the  two.  As  in  a  dream, 
or  as  if  he  had  been  looking  at  something  at  the 
play,  he  was  conscious  that  the  Turk's  hair  and 
beard  lay  upon  the  table,  and  that  Lord  Sannox 
was  leaning  against  the  wall  with  his  hand  to  his 
side,  laughing  silently.  The  screams  had  died 
away  now,  and  the  dreadful  head  had  dropped 
back  again  upon  the  pillow,  but  Douglas  Stone 
still  sat  motionless,  and  Lord  Sannox  still  chuck- 
led quietly  to  himself. 

"  It  was  really  very  necessary  for  Marion,  this 
operation,"  said  he,  "  not  physically,  but  morally, 
you  know,  morally." 

Douglas  Stone  stooped  forwards  and  began  to 
play  with  the  fringe  of  the  coverlet.  His  knife 
tinkled  down  upon  the  ground,  but  he  still  held 
the  forceps  and  something  more. 

"  I  had  long  intended  to  make  a  little  exam- 
ple," said  Lord  Sannox,  suavely.  "Your  note 
of  Wednesday  miscarried,  and  I  have  it  here 
in  my  pocket-book.  I  took  some  pains  in  car- 
rying out  my  idea.  The  wound,  by  the  way, 
was  from  nothing  more  dangerous  than  my  signet 
ring." 

He  glanced  keenly  at  his  silent  companion,  and 
cocked  the  small  revolver  which  he  held  in  his 
coat  pocket.  But  Douglas  Stone  was  still  picking 
at  the  coverlet, 


160  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

"  You  see  you  have  kept  your  appointment 
after  all,"  said  Lord  Sannox. 

And  at  that  Douglas  Stone  began  to  laugh. 
He  laughed  long  and  loudly.  But  Lord  Stannox 
did  not  laugh  now.  Something  like  fear  sharp- 
ened and  hardened  his  features.  He  walked  from 
the  room,  and  he  walked  on  tiptoe.  The  old 
woman  was  waiting  outside. 

"  Attend  to  your  mistress  when  she  awakes," 
said  Lord  Sannox, 

Then  he  went  down  to  the  street.  The  cab 
was  at  the  door,  and  the  driver  raised  his  hand  to 
his  hat. 

"John,"  said  Lord  Sannox,  "you  will  take  the 
doctor  home  first.  He  will  want  leading  down, 
stairs,  I  think.  Tell  his  butler  that  he  has  been 
taken  ill  at  a  case." 

"Very  good,  sir." 

"  Then  you  can  take  Lady  Sannox  home, '' 

"  And  how  about  yourself,  sir  ?  " 

"  Oh,  my  address  for  the  next  few  months  will 
be  Hotel  di  Roma,  Venice.  Just  see  that  the 
letters  are  sent  on.  And  tell  Stevens  to  exhibit 
all  the  purple  chrysanthemums  next  Monday  and 
to  wire  me  the  result." 


A  QUESTION  OF  DIPLOMACY. 

The  Foreign  Minister  was  down  with  the  gout. 
For  a  week  he  had  been  confined  to  the  house, 
and  he  had  missed  two  Cabinet  Councils  at  a  time 
when  the  pressure  upon  his  department  was  se- 
vere. It  is  true  that  he  had  an  excellent  under- 
secretary and  an  admirable  staff,  but  the  Minister 
was  a  man  of  such  ripe  experience  and  of  such 
proven  sagacity  that  things  halted  in  his  absence. 
When  his  firm  hand  was  at  the  wheel  the  great 
ship  of  State  rode  easily  and  smoothly  upon  her 
way ;  when  it  was  removed  she  yawed  and  stag- 
gered until  twelve  British  editors  rose  up  in  their 
omniscience  and  traced  out  twelve  several  courses, 
each  of  which  was  the  sole  and  only  path  to 
safety.  Then  it  was  that  the  Opposition  said 
vain  things,  and  that  the  harassed  Prime  Min- 
ister prayed  for  his  absent  colleague. 

The  Foreign  Minister  sat  in  his  dressing-room 
in  the  great  house  in  Cavendish  Square.  It  was 
May,  and  the  square  garden  shot  up  like  a  veil 
of  green  in  front  of  his  window,  but,  in  spite  of 


162  ROUXD  THE  RED  LAMP. 

the  sunshine,  a  fire  crackled  and  sputtered  in  the 
grate  of  the  sick-room.  In  a  deep-red  plush  arm- 
chair sat  the  great  statesman,  his  head  leaning 
back  upon  a  silken  pillow,  one  foot  stretched  for- 
ward and  supported  upon  a  padded  rest.  His 
deeply-lined,  finely-chiselled  face  and  slow-mov- 
ing, heavily-pouched  eyes  were  turned  upwards 
towards  the  carved  and  painted  ceiling,  with  that 
inscrutable  expression  which  had  been  the  despair 
and  the  admiration  of  his  Continental  colleagues 
upon  the  occasion  of  the  famous  Congress  jrhen 
he  had  made  his  first  appearance  in  the  arena  of 
European  diplomacy.  Yet  at  the  present  moment 
his  capacity  for  hiding  his  emotions  had  for  the 
instant  failed  him,  for  about  the  lines  of  his 
strong,  straight  mouth  and  the  puckers  of  his 
broad,  overhanging  forehead,  there  were  sufficient 
indications  of  the  restlessness  and  impatience 
which  consumed  him. 

And  indeed  there  was  enough  to  make  a  man 
chafe,  for  he  had  much  to  think  of  and  yet  was 
bereft  of  the  power  of  thought.  There  was,  for 
example,  that  question  of  the  Dobrutscha  and  the 
navigation  of  the  mouths  of  the  Danube  which 
was  ripe  for  settlement.  The  Russian  Chancellor 
had  sent  a  masterly  statement  upon  the  subject, 
and  it  was  the  pet  ambition  of  our  Minister  to 
answer  it  in  a  worthy  fashion^  Then  there  was 
the  blockade  of  Crete,  and  the  British  fleet  lying 


A   QUESTION  OF  DIPLOMACY.  163 

off  Cape  Matapan,  waiting  for  instructions  which 
might  change  the  course  of  European  history. 
And  there  were  those  three  unfortunate  Macedo- 
nian tourists,  whose  friends  were  momentarily 
expecting  to  receive  their  ears  or  their  fingers  in 
default  of  the  exorbitant  ransom  which  had  been 
demanded.  They  must  be  plucked  out  of  those 
mountains,  by  force  or  by  diplomacy,  or  an  out- 
raged public  would  vent  its  wrath  upon  Downing 
Street.  All  these  questions  pressed  for  a  solution, 
and  yet  here  was  the  Foreign  Minister  of  Eng- 
land, planted  in  an  arm-chair,  with  his  whole 
thoughts  and  attention  riveted  ujion  the  ball  of 
his  right  toe !  It  was  humiliating— horribly  hu- 
miliating !  His  reason  revolted  at  it.  He  had 
been  a  respecter  of  himself,  a  respecter  of  his  own 
will ;  but  what  sort  of  a  machine  was  it  which 
could  be  utterly  thrown  out  of  gear  by  a  little 
piece  of  inflamed  gristle  ?  He  groaned  and  writhed 
among  his  cushions. 

But,  after  all,  was  it  quite  impossible  that  he 
should  go  down  to  the  House  ?  Perhaps  the  doc- 
tor was  exaggerating  the  situation.  There  was  a 
Cabinet  Council  that  day.  He  glanced  at  his 
watch.  It  must  be  nearly  over  by  now.  But  at 
least  he  might  perhaps  venture  to  drive  down  as 
far  as  Westminster.  He  pushed  back  the  little 
round  table  with  its  bristle  of  medicine-bottles, 
and  levering  himself  up  with  a  hand  upon  either 


164  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

arm  of  the  chair,  he  clutched  a  thick  oak  stick 
and  hobbled  slowly  across  the  room.  For  a  mo- 
ment as  he  moved,  his  energy  of  mind  and  body 
seemed  to  return  to  him.  The  British  fleet  should 
sail  from  Matapan.  Pressure  should  be  brought 
to  bear  upon  the  Turks.  The  Greeks  should  be 
shown— Ovv  !  In  an  instant  the  Mediterranean 
was  blotted  out,  and  nothing  remained  but  that 
huge,  undeniable,  intrusive,  red-hot  toe.  He 
staggered  to  the  window  and  rested  his  left  hand 
upon  the  ledge,  while  he  propped  himself  upon 
his  stick  with  his  right.  Outside  lay  the  bright, 
cool,  square  garden,  a  few  well-dressed  passers- 
by,  and  a  single,  neatly-appointed  carriage,  which 
was  driving  away  from  his  own  door.  His  quick 
eye  caught  the  coat-of-arms  on  the  panel,  and  his 
lips  set  for  a  moment  and  his  bushy  eyebrows 
gathered  ominously  with  a  deep  furrow  between 
them.  He  hobbled  back  to  his  seat  and  struck 
the  gong  which  stood  upon  the  table. 

"Your  mistress!  "  said  he  as  the  serving-man 
entered. 

It  was  clear  that  it  was  impossible  to  think  of 
going  to  the  House.  The  shooting  up  his  leg 
warned  him  that  his  doctor  had  not  overesti- 
mated the  situation.  But  he  had  a  little  mental 
worry  now  which  had  for  the  moment  eclipsed  his 
physical  ailments.  He  tapped  the  ground  im- 
patiently with  his  stick  until  the  door  of  the 


A  QUESTION  OF  DlPLOxMACY.  165 

dressing-room  swung  open,  and  a  tall,  elegant 
lady  of  rather  more  than  middle  age  swept  into 
the  chamber.  Her  hair  was  touched  with  grey, 
but  her  calm,  sweet  face  had  all  the  freshness  of 
youth,  and  her  gown  of  green  shot  plush,  with  a 
sparkle  of  gold  passementerie  at  her  bosom  and 
shoulders,  showed  off  the  lines  of  her  fine  figure 
to  their  best  advantage. 

"  You  sent  for  me,  Charles  ?  " 

"  Whose  carriage  was  that  which  drove  away- 
just  now?" 

"Oh,  you've  been  up !  ■' she  cried,  shaking  an 
admonitory  forefinger.  "  What  an  old  dear  it  is  ! 
How  can  you  be  so  rash  ?  What  am  I  to  say  to 
Sir  William  when  he  comes  ?  You  know  that  he 
gives  up  his  cases  when  they  are  insubordinate." 

"  In  this  instance  the  case  may  give  him  up," 
said  the  Minister,  peevishly ;  "  but  I  must  beg, 
Clara,  that  you  will  answer  my  question." 

"Oh!  the  carriage!  It  must  have  been  Lord 
Arthur  Sibthorpe's." 

"  I  saw  the  three  chevrons  upon  the  panel," 
muttered  the  invalid. 

His  lady  had  pulled  herself  a  little  straighter 
and  opened  her  large  blue  eyes. 

"Then  why  ask?"  she  said.  "One  might 
almost  think,  Charles,  that  you  were  laying  a 
trap  !  Did  you  expect  that  I  should  deceive  you  ? 
You  have  not  had  your  lithia  powder." 


166  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

"For  Heaven's  sake,  leave  it  alone  !  I  asked 
because  I  was  surprised  tliat  Lord  Arthur  should 
call  here.  I  should  have  fancied,  Clara,  that  I 
had  made  myself  sufficiently  clear  on  that  point. 
Who  received  him  ?  " 

"I  did.     That  is,  I  and  Ida." 

"  I  will  not  have  him  brought  into  contact  with 
Ida.  I  do  not  approve  of  it.  The  matter  has 
gone  too  far  already." 

Lady  Clara  seated  herself  on  a  velvet-topped 
footstool,  and  bent  her  stately  figure  over  the 
Minister's  hand,  which  she  patted  softly  between 
her  own. 

"Now  you  have  said  it,  Charles,"  said  she. 
"It  has  gone  too  far — I  give  you  my  word,  dear, 
that  I  never  suspected  it  until  it  was  past  all 
mending.  I  may  be  to  blame — no  doubt  I  am  ; 
but  it  was  all  so  sudden.  The  tail  end  of  the  sea- 
son and  a  week  at  Lord  Donnythorne's.  That 
was  all.  But  oh  !  Charlie,  she  loves  him  so,  and 
she  is  our  only  one  !  How  can  we  make  her  mis- 
erable ? " 

"Tut,  tut!"  cried  the  Minister  impatiently, 
slapping  on  the  plush  arm  of  his  chair.  "This  is 
too  much.  I  tell  you,  Clara,  I  give  you  my  word, 
that  all  my  official  duties,  all  the  affairs  of  this 
great  empire,  do  not  give  me  the  trouble  that  Ida 
does." 

"  But  she  is  our  only  one,  Charles." 


A  QUESTION  OF  DIPLOMACY.  167 

"The  more  reason  that  she  should  not  make  a 
mesalliance.'^ 

"■Mesalliance,  Charles!  Lord  Arthur  Sib- 
thorpe,  son  of  the  Duke  of  Tavistock,  with  a  pedi- 
gree from  the  Heptarchy.  Debrett  takes  them 
right  back  to  Morcar,  Earl  of  Xorthumberland." 

The  Minister  shrugged  his  shoulders. 

"  Lord  Arthur  is  the  fourth  son  of  the  poorest 
duke  in  England,"  said  he.  "He  has  neither 
prospects  nor  profession." 

"But,  oh  !  Charlie,  you  could  find  him  both." 

"  I  do  not  like  him.  I  do  not  care  for  the  con- 
nection." 

"  But  consider  Ida  !  You  know  how  frail  her 
health  is.  Her  whole  soul  is  set  upon  him.  You 
would  not  have  the  heart,  Charles,  to  separate 
them?" 

There  was  a  tap  at  the  door.  Lady  Clara 
swept  towards  it  and  threw  it  open. 

"Yes,  Thomas?" 

"  If  you  please,  my  lady,  the  Prime  Minister 
is  below." 

"  Show  him  up,  Thomas." 

"Now,  Charlie,  you  must  not  excite  yourself 
over  public  matters.  Be  very  good  and  cool  and 
reasonable,  like  a  darling.  I  am  sure  that  I  may 
trust  you." 

She  threw  her  light  shawl  round  the  invalid's 
shoulders,  and  slipped  away  into  the  bed-room  as 


168  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

the  great  man  was  ushered  in  at  the  door  of  the 
dressing-room. 

"My  dear  Charles,"  said  he  cordially,  step- 
ping into  the  room  with  all  the  boyish  briskness 
for  which  he  was  famous,  "I  trust  that  you  find 
yourself  a  little  better.  Almost  ready  for  harness, 
eh  ?  We  miss  you  sadly,  both  in  the  House  and 
in  the  Council.  Quite  a  storm  brewing  over  this 
Grecian  business.  The  Times  took  a  nasty  line 
this  morning." 

"  So  I  saw,"  said  the  invalid,  smiling  up  at  his 
chief.  "Well,  well,  we  must  let  them  see  that 
the  country  is  not  entirely  ruled  from  Printing 
House  Square  yet.  We  must  keep  our  own 
course  without  faltering." 

"Certainly,  Charles,  most  undoubtedly,"  as- 
sented the  Prime  Minister,  with  his  hands  in  his 
pockets. 

"  It  was  so  kind  of  you  to  call.  I  am  all  im- 
patience to  know  what  was  done  in  the  Council." 

"Pure  formalities,  nothing  more.  By-the- 
way,  the  Macedonian  prisoners  are  all  right." 

"  Thank  Goodness  for  that !  " 

"We  adjourned  all  other  business  until  we 
should  have  you  with  us  next  week.  The  ques- 
tion of  a  dissolution  begins  to  press.  The  reports 
from  the  provinces  are  excellent." 

.  The  Foreign  Minister  moved  impatiently  and 
groaned. 


A  QUESTION  OF  DIPLOMACY.  169 

"We  must  really  straighten  up  our  foreign 
business  a  little,"  said  he.  "I  must  get  Novi- 
koff' s  Note  answered.  It  is  clever,  but  the  falla- 
cies are  obvious.  I  wish,  too,  we  could  clear  up 
the  Afghan  frontier.  This  illness  is  most  exas- 
perating. There  is  so  much  to  be  done,  but  my 
brain  is  clouded.  Sometimes  I  think  it  is  the 
gout,  and  sometimes  I  put  it  down  to  the  col- 
chicum." 

"What  will  our  medical  autocrat  say?" 
laughed  the  Prime  Minister.  "You  are  so  irrev- 
erent, Charles.  With  a  bishop  one  may  feel  at 
one's  ease.  They  are  not  beyond  the  reach  of 
argument.  But  a  doctor  with  his  stethoscope  and 
thermometer  is  a  thing  apart.  Your  reading  does 
not  imi)inge  upon  him.  He  is  serenely  above  you. 
And  then,  of  course,  he  takes  you  at  a  disadvan- 
tage. With  he%lth  and  strength  one  might  cope 
with  him.  Have  you  read  Hahnemann?  What 
are  your  views  upon  Hahnemann  ? " 

The  invalid  knew  his  illustrious  colleague  too 
well  to  follow  him  down  any  of  those  by-paths 
of  knowledge  in  which  he  delighted  to  wander. 
To  his  intensely  shrewd  and  practical  mind  there 
was  something  repellent  in  the  waste  of  energy 
involved  in  a  discussion  upon  the  Early  Church 
or  the  twenty-seven  principles  of  Mesmer.  It  was 
his  custom  to  slip  past  such  conversational  open- 
ings with  a  quick  step  and  an  averted  face. 

12 


170  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

"I  have  hardly  glanced  at  his  writings,"  said 
he.  "By-the-way,  I  suppose  that  there  was  no 
special  departmental  news  ?  " 

"Ah!  I  had  almost  forgotten.  Yes,  it  was 
one  of  the  things  which  I  had  called  to  tell  you. 
Sir  Algernon  Jones  has  resigned  at  Tangier. 
There  is  a  vacancy  there. " 

"It  had  better  be  filled  at  once.  The  longer 
delay  the  more  applicants." 

"Ah,  patronage,  patronage!"  sighed  the 
Prime  Minister.  "Every  vacancy  makes  one 
doubtful  friend  and  a  dozen  very  positive  ene- 
mies. Who  so  bitter  as  the  disappointed  place- 
seeker?  But  you  are  right,  Charles.  Better  fill 
it  at  once,  especially  as  there  is  some  little  trouble 
in  Morocco.  I  understand  that  the  Duke  of  Tavi- 
stock would  like  the  place  for  his  fourth  son. 
Lord  Arthur  Sibthorpe.  We  are  under  some  ob- 
ligation to  the  Duke." 

The  Foreign  Minister  sat  up  eagerly. 

"My  dear  friend,"  he  said,  "it  is  the  very  ap- 
pointment which  I  should  have  suggested.  Lord 
Arthur  would  be  very  much  better  in  Tangier  at 
present  than  in — in " 

"Cavendish  Square?"  hazarded  his  chief,  with 
a  little  arch  query  of  his  eyebrows. 

"Well,  let  us  say  London.  lie  has  manner 
and  tact.  He  was  at  Constantinople  in  Norton's 
time." 


A  QUESTION  OF   DIPLOMACY.  171 

"Then  he  talks  Arabic  ?  " 

"  A  smattering.    But  his  French  is  good." 

"Speaking  of  Arabic,  Charles,  have  you 
dipped  into  Averroes  ?  " 

"  No,  I  have  not.  But  the  appointment  would 
be  an  excellent  one  in  every  way.  Would  you 
have  the  great  goodness  to  arrange  the  matter  in 
my  absence  ? " 

"Certainly,  Charles,  certainly.  Is  there  any- 
thing else  that  I  can  do  ? " 

"No.     I  hope  to  be  in  the  House  by  Monday." 

"  I  trust  so.  We  miss  you  at  every  turn.  The 
Times  will  try  to  make  mischief  over  that  Grecian 
business,  A  leader-writer  is  a  terribly  irrespon- 
sible thing,  Charles.  There  is  no  method  by 
which  he  may  be  confuted,  however  preposterous 
his  assertions.  Good-bye  !  Read  Porson  !  Good- 
bye ! " 

He  shook  the  invalid's  hand,  gave  a  jaunty 
wave  of  his  broad-brimmed  hat,  and  darted  out 
of  the  room  with  the  same  elasticity  and  energy 
with  which  he  had  entered  it. 

The  footman  had  already  opened  the  great 
folding  door  to  usher  the  illustrious  visitor  to 
his  carriage,  when  a  lady  stepped  from  the  draw 
ing-room  and  touched  him  on  the  sleeve.  From 
behind  the  half-closed  portiere  of  stamped  velvet 
a  little  pale  face  peeped  out,  half -curious,  half- 


172  ilOUND  THE  RED  LAMP, 

"  May  I  have  one  word  ? " 

"Surely,  Lady  Clara." 

"I  hope  it  is  not  intrusive.  I  would  not  for 
the  world  overstep  the  limits " 

"My  dear  Lady  Clara  ! "  interrupted  the  Prime 
Minister,  with  a  youthful  bow  and  wave. 

"Pray  do  not  answer  me  if  I  go  too  far.  But 
I  know  that  Lord  Arthur  Sibthorpe  has  applied 
for  Tangier.  Would  it  be  a  liberty  if  I  asked  you 
what  chance  he  has  ? " 

"  The  post  is  filled  up." 

"Oh!" 

In  the  foreground  and  background  there  was  a 
disappointed  face. 

"And  Lord  Arthur  has  it." 

The  Prime  Minister  chuckled  over  his  little 
piece  of  roguery. 

"We  have  just  decided  it,"  he  continued, 
"Lord  Arthur  must  go  in  a  w^eek.  I  am  de- 
lighted to  perceive.  Lady  Clara,  that  the  appoint- 
ment has  your  approval.  Tangier  is  a  place  of 
extraordinary  interest.  Catherine  of  Braganza 
and  Colonel  Kirke  will  occur  to  your  memory. 
Burton  has  written  well  upon  Northern  Africa. 
I  dine  at  Windsor,  so  I  am  sure  that  you  will  ex- 
cuse my  leaving  you.  I  trust  that  Lord  Charles 
w^ill  be  better.  He  can  hardly  fail  to  be  so  with 
such  a  nurse." 

He  bowed,  waved,  and  was  off  down  the  steps 


A   QUESTION  OP   DIPLOMACY.  173 

to  Ms  brougham.  As  he  drove  away,  Lady  Clara 
could  see  that  he  was  already  deeply  absorbed  in 
a  paper-covered  novel. 

She  pushed  back  the  velvet  curtains,  and  re- 
turned into  the  drawing-room.  Her  daughter 
stood  in  the  sunlight  by  the  window,  tall,  fragile, 
and  exquisite,  her  features  and  outline  not  unlike 
her  mother's,  but  frailer,  softer,  more  delicate. 
The  golden  light  struck  one  half  of  her  high-bred, 
sensitive  face,  and  glimmered  upon  her  thickly- 
coiled  flaxen  hair,  striking  a  pinkish  tint  from 
her  closely-cut  costume  of  fawn-coloured  cloth 
with  its  dainty  cinnamon  ruchings.  One  little 
soft  frill  of  chiffon  nestled  round  her  throat,  from 
which  the  white,  graceful  neck  and  well-poised 
head  shot  up  like  a  lily  amid  moss.  Her  thin 
white  hands  were  pressed  together,  and  her  blue 
eyes  turned  beseechingly  upon  her  mother. 

"  Silly  girl  !  Silly  girl !  "  said  the  matron,  an- 
sw^ering  that  imj)loring  look.  She  put  her  hands 
upon  her  daughter's  sloping  shoulders  and  drew 
her  tow^ards  her.  "It  is  a  very  nice  jjlace  for  a 
short  time.     It  will  be  a  stepjDing  stone." 

"  But  oh  !  mamma,  in  a  week  !    Poor  Arthur ! " 

"  He  will  be  happy." 

"What !  happy  to  part  % " 

"He  need  not  part.     You  shall  go  with  him." 

"Oh  !  mamma  !  " 

"Yes,  I  say  it." 


174  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

"  Oh  !  mamma,  in  a  week  1 " 

"Yes  indeed.  A  great  deal  may  be  done  in  a 
week.     I  shall  order  your  trousseau  to-day. " 

"Oh!  you  dear,  sweet  angel!  But  I  am  so 
frightened !  And  papa  ?  Oh !  dear,  I  am  so 
frightened ! " 

"Your  papa  is  a  diplomatist,  dear." 

"Yes,  ma." 

"  But,  between  ourselves,  he  married  a  diplo- 
matist too.  If  he  can  manage  the  British  Empire, 
I  think  that  I  can  manage  him,  Ida.  How  long 
have  you  been  engaged,  child  ? " 

"  Ten  weeks,  mamma." 

"  Then  it  is  quite  time  it  came  to  a  head. 
Lord  Arthur  cannot  leave  England  without  you. 
You  must  go  to  Tangier  as  the  Minister's  wife. 
Now,  you  will  sit  there  on  the  settee,  dear,  and 
let  me  manage  entirely.  There  is  Sir  William's 
carriage !  I  do  think  that  I  know  how  to  man- 
age Sir  William.  James,  just  ask  the  doctor  to 
step  in  this  way  !  " 

A  heavy,  two-horsed  carriage  had  drawn  up 
at  the  door,  and  there  came  a  single  stately  thud 
upon  the  knocker.  An  instant  afterwards  the 
drawing-room  door  flew  open  and  the  footman 
ushered  in  the  famous  physician.  He  was  a 
small  man,  clean-shaven,  with  the  old-fashioned 
black  dress  and  white  cravat  with  high-standing 
collar.     He  swung  his  golden  jpince-nez  in  his 


A   QUESTION   OF   DIPLOMACY.  I75 

right  hand  as  he  walked,  and  bent  forward  with 
a  peering,  blinking  expression,  which  was  some- 
how suggestive  of  the  dark  and  complex  cases 
through  which  he  had  seen. 

"Ah!"  said  he,  as  he  entered.  "My  young 
patient !     I  am  glad  of  the  opportunity." 

"Yes,  I  wish  to  speak  to  you  about  her,  Sir 
William.     Pray  take  this  arm-chair." 

"Thank  you,  I  will  sit  beside  her,"  said  he, 
taking  his  place  upon  the  settee.  "  She  is  look- 
ing better,  less  anaemic  unquestionably,  and  a 
fuller  pulse.  Quite  a  little  tinge  of  colour,  and 
yet  not  hectic." 

"  I  feel  stronger,  Sir  William." 
"  But  she  still  has  the  pain  in  the  side." 
"Ah,  that  pain!"     He  tapped  lightly  under 
the  collar-bones,  and  then  bent  forward  with  his 
biaural  stethoscope  in  either  ear.    "  Still  a  trace  of 
dulness — still  a  slight  crepitation,"  he  murmured. 
"  You  spoke  of  a  change,  doctor." 
"Yes,  certainly  a  judicious  change  might  be 
advisable." 

"  You  said  a  dry  climate.  I  wish  to  do  to  the 
letter  what  you  recommend." 

"  You  have  always  been  model  patients." 
"  We  wish  to  be.     You  said  a  dry  climate." 
" Did  I?    I  rather  forget  the  particulars  of  our 
conversation.     But  a  dry  climate  is  certainly  indi- 
cated." 


176  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

"Which  one?" 

"  Well,  I  think  really  that  a  patient  should  be 
allowed  some  latitude.  I  must  not  exact  too  rigid 
discipline.  There  is  room  for  individual  choice — 
the  Engadine,  Central  Europe,  Egypt,  Algiers, 
which  you  like." 

*'  I  hear  that  Tangier  is  also  recommended." 

"Oh,  yes,  certainly  ;  it  is  very  dry." 

"You  hear,  Ida?  Sir  William  says  that  yon 
are  to  go  to  Tangier." 

"Or  any " 

"No,  no,  Sir  William!  We  feel  safest  when 
we  are  most  obedient.  You  have  said  Tangier, 
and  we  shall  certainly  try  Tangier. " 

"Really,  Lady  Clara,  your  implicit  faith  is 
most  flattering.  It  is  not  everyone  who  would  sac- 
rifice their  own  plans  and  inclinations  so  readily." 

"We  know  your  skill  and  your  experience, 
Sir  William.  Ida  shall  try  Tangier.  I  am  con- 
vinced that  she  will  be  benefited." 

"  I  have  no  doubt  of  it." 

"But  you  know  Lord  Charles.  He  is  just  a 
little  inclined  to  decide  medical  matters  as  he  would 
an  affair  of  State.  I  hope  that  you  will  be  firm 
with  him." 

"As  long  as  Lord  Charles  honours  me  so  far 
as  to  ask  my  advice  I  am  sure  that  he  would  not 
place  me  in  the  false  position  of  having  that  advice 
disregarded." 


A   QUESTION   OP   DIPLOMACY.  177 

The  medical  baronet  whirled  round  the  cord 
of  his  pince-nez  and  pushed  out  a  protesting 
hand. 

"No,  no,  but  you  must  be  firm  on  the  point  of 
Tangier." 

"  Having  deliberately  formed  the  opinion  that 
Tangier  is  the  best  place  for  our  young  patient,  I 
do  not  think  that  I  shall  readily  change  my  con- 
viction." 

"Of  course  not." 

"I  shall  speak  to  Lord  Charles  upon  the  sub- 
ject now  when  I  go  upstairs." 

"Pray  do." 

"And  meanwhile  she  will  continue  her  present 
course  of  treatment.  I  trust  that  the  warm  Afri- 
can air  may  send  her  back  in  a  few  months  with 
all  her  energy  restored." 

He  bowed  in  the  courteous,  sweeping,  old-world 
fashion  which  had  done  so  much  to  build  up  his 
ten  thousand  a  year,  and,  with  the  stealthy  gait 
of  a  man  whose  life  is  spent  in  sick-rooms,  he  fol- 
lowed the  footman  upstairs. 

As  the  red  velvet  curtains  swept  back  into 
position,  the  Lady  Ida  threw  her  arms  round 
her  mother's  neck  and  sank  her  face  on  to  her 
bosom. 

"Oh!  mamma,  you  are  a  diplomatist!"  she 
cried. 

But  her  mothers  expression  was  rather  that 


178  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

of  the  general  wlio  looked  upon  the  first  smoke 
of  the  guns  than  of  one  who  had  won  the  vic- 
tory. 

"All  will  be  right,  dear,"  said  she,  glancing 
down  at  the  fluffy  yellow  curls  and  tiny  ear. 
"There  is  still  much  to  be  done,  but  I  think  we 
may  venture  to  order  the  trousseau.''^ 

**  Oh !  how  brave  you  are  ! " 

"  Of  course,  it  will  in  any  case  be  a  very  quiet 
affair.  Arthur  must  get  the  license.  I  do  not  ap- 
prove of  hole-and-corner  marriages,  but  where  the 
gentleman  has  to  take  up  an  official  position  some 
allowance  must  be  made.  We  can  have  Lady 
Hilda  Edgecombe,  and  the  Trevors,  and  the  Gre- 
villes,  and  I  am  sure  that  the  Prime  Minister 
would  run  down  if  he  could." 

"And  papa?" 

"Oh,  yes;  he  will  come  too,  if  he  is  well 
enough.  We  must  wait  until  Sir  William  goes, 
and,  meanwhile,  I  shall  write  to  Lord  Arthur." 

Half  an  hour  had  passed,  and  quite  a  number 
of  notes  had  been  dashed  off  in  the  fine,  bold, 
park-paling  handwriting  of  the  Lady  Clara,  when 
the  door  clashed,  and  the  wheels  of  the  doctor's 
carriage  were  heard  grating  outside  against  the 
kerb.  The  Lady  Clara  laid  down  her  pen,  kissed 
her  daughter,  and  started  off  for  the  sick-room. 
The  Foreign  Minister  was  lying  back  in  his  chair, 
with  a  red  silk  handkerchief  over  his  forehead, 


A  QUESTION   OP   DIPLOMACY.  1^9 

and  Ms  bulbous,  cotton- wadded  foot  still  protrud- 
ing upon  its  rest. 

"  I  think  it  is  almost  liniment  time,"  said  Lady 
Clara,  shaking  a  blue  crinkled  bottle.  "  Shall  I 
put  on  a  little  ? " 

''  Oh  !  this  pestilent  toe  !  "  groaned  the  sufferer. 
"Sir  William  won't  hear  of  my  moving  yet. 
I  do  think  he  is  the  most  completely  obstinate 
and  pig-headed  man  that  I  have  ever  met.  I 
tell  him  that  he  has  mistaken  his  profession,  and 
that  I  could  find  him  a  post  at  Constantinople. 
We  need  a  mule  out  there." 

"Poor  Sir  William!"  laughed  Lady  Clara. 
"  But  how  has  he  roused  your  wrath  ? " 

"  He  is  so  persistent — so  dogmatic." 

"  Upon  what  point  ? " 

"  Well,  he  has  been  laying  down  the  law 
about  Ida.  He  has  decreed,  it  seems,  that  she  is 
to  go  to  Tangier." 

"He  said  something  to  that  effect  before  he 
went  up  to  you." 

"Oh,  he  did,  did  he?" 

The  slow-moving,  inscrutable  eye  came  sliding 
round  to  her. 

Lady  Clara's  face  had  assumed  an  expression 
of  transparent  obvious  innocence,  an  intrusive 
candour  which  is  never  seen  in  nature  save  when 
a  woman  is  bent  upon  deception. 

"He  examined  her  lungs,   Charles.      He  did 


180  ROUND  THE   RED   LAMP. 

not  say  much,  but  liis  expression  was'  very 
grave." 

"Not  to  say  owlish,"  interrupted  the  Min- 
ister. 

"N'o,  no,  Charles;  it  is  no  laughing  matter. 
He  said  that  she  must  have  a  change.  I  am 
sure  that  he  thought  more  than  he  said.  lie 
spoke  of  dulness  and  crepitation,  and  the  effects 
of  the  African  air.  Then  the  talk  turned  upon 
dry,  bracing  health  resorts,  and  he  agreed  that 
Tangier  was  the  place.  He  said  that  even  a  few 
months  there  would  work  a  change." 

"  And  that  was  all  ? " 

"Yes,  that  was  all." 

Lord  Charles  shrugged  his  shoulders  with  the 
air  of  a  man  who  is  but  half  convinced. 

"But  of  course,"  said  Lady  Clara,  serenely, 
"if  you  think  it  better  that  Ida  should  not  go 
she  shall  not.  The  only  thing  is  that  if  she 
should  get  worse  we  might  feel  ^  little  uncom- 
fortable afterwards.  In  a  weakness  of  that  sort 
a  very  short  time  may  make  a  difference.  Sir 
William  evidently  thought  the  matter  critical. 
Still,  there  is  no  reason  why  he  should  influ- 
ence you.  It  is  a  little  responsibility,  however. 
If  you  take  it  all  upon  yourself  and  free  me  from 
any  of  it,  so  that  afterwards " 

"  My  dear  Clara,  how  you  do  croak  !  " 

"Oh!  I  don't  wish  to  do  that,  Charles.     But 


A   QUESTION  OF   DIPLOMACY.  ISl 

you  remember  what  happened  to  Lord  Bellamy's 
child.  She  was  just  Ida's  age.  That  was  another 
case  in  which  Sir  William's  advice  was  disre- 
garded. " 

Lord  Charles  groaned  impatiently. 

"  I  have  not  disregarded  it,"  said  he. 

"No,  no,  of  course  not.  I  know  your  strong 
sense,  and  your  good  heart  too  well,  dear.  You 
were  very  wisely  looking  at  both  sides  of  the 
question.  That  is  what  we  poor  women  cannot 
do.  It  is  emotion  against  reason,  as  I  have  often 
heard  you  say.  We  are  swayed  this  way  and 
that,  but  you  men  are  persistent,  and  so  you  gain 
your  way  with  us.  But  I  am  so  pleased  that  you 
have  decided  for  Tangier." 

"Havel?" 

"Well,  dear,  you  said  that  you  would  not 
disregard  Sir  William." 

"Well,  Clara,  admitting  that  Ida  is  to  go  to 
Tangier,  you  will  allow  that  it  is  impossible  for 
me  to  escort  her  ? " 

"Utterly." 

"And  for  you? " 

"While  you  are  ill  my  place  is  by  your  side." 

"There  is  your  sister  ? " 

"  She  is  going  to  Florida." 

"  Lady  Dumbarton,  then  ?  " 

"She  is  nursing  her  father.  It  is  out  of  the 
question." 


1S2  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

"Well,  then,  whom  can  we  possibly  ask  ? 
Especially  just  as  the  season  is  commencing. 
You  see,  Clara,  the  fates  fight  against  Sir 
William." 

His  wife  rested  her  elbows  against  the  back 
of  the  great  red  chair,  and  passed  her  fingers 
through  the  statesman's  grizzled  curls,  stooping 
down  as  she  did  so  until  her  lips  were  close  to 
his  ear. 

"There  is  Lord  Arthur  Sibthorpe,"  said  she 
softly. 

Lord  Charles  bounded  in  his  chair,  and  mut- 
tered a  word  or  two  such  as  were  more  fre- 
quently heard  from  Cabinet  Ministers  in  Lord 
Melbourne's  time  than  now. 

"Are  you  mad,  Clara!"  he  cried.  "What 
can  have  put  such  a  thought  into  your  head  ? " 

"The  Prime  Minister." 

' '  Who  ?    The  Prime  Minister  ? " 

"  Yes,  dear.  Now  do,  do  be  good !  Or  per- 
haps I  had  better  not  speak  to  you  about  it  any 
more." 

"Well,  I  really  think  that  you  have  gone 
rather  too  far  to  retreat." 

"It  was  the  Prime  Minister,  then,  who  told 
me  that  Lord  Arthur  was  going  to  Tangier. " 

"It  is  a  fact,  though  it  had  escaped  my  mem- 
ory for  the  instant." 

"And  then  came  Sir  William  with  his  advice 


A  QUESTION   OP   DIPLOMACY.  183 

about  Ida.  Oh !  Charlie,  it  is  surely  more  than 
a  coincidence !  " 

"  I  am  convinced,"  said  Lord  Charles,  with  his 
shrewd,  questioning  gaze,  "  that  it  is  very  much 
more  than  a  coincidence.  Lady  Clara.  You  are  a 
very  clever  woman,  my  dear.  A  born  manager 
and  organiser." 

Lady  Clara  brushed  past  the  compliment. 

"  Think  of  our  own  young  days,  Charlie,"  she 
whispered,  with  her  fingers  still  toying  with  his 
hair.  "What  were  you  then?  A  poor  man,  not 
even  Ambassador  at  Tangier.  But  I  loved  you, 
and  believed  in  you,  and  have  I  ever  regretted  it  ? 
Ida  loves  and  believes  in  Lord  Arthur,  and  why 
should  she  ever  regret  it  either  ? " 

Lord  Charles  was  silent.  His  eyes  were  fixed 
upon  the  green  branches  which  waved  outside  the 
window  ;  but  his  mind  had  flashed  back  to  a  Dev- 
onshire country-house  of  thirty  years  ago,  and  to 
the  one  fateful  evening  when,  between  old  yew 
hedges,  he  paced  along  beside  a  slender  girl,  and 
poured  out  to  her  his  hopes,  his  fears,  and  his 
ambitions.  He  took  the  white,  thin  hand  and 
pressed  it  to  his  lips. 

"You  have  been  a  good  wife  to  me,  Clara," 
said  he. 

She  said  nothing.  She  did  not  attempt  to  im- 
prove upon  her  advantage.  A  less  consummate 
general  might  have  tried  to  do  so,  and  ruined  all. 


184  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

She  stood  silent  and  submissive,  noting  the  quick 
play  of  thought  which  peeped  from  his  eyes  and 
lip.  There  was  a  sparkle  in  the  one  and  a  twitch 
of  amusement  in  the  other,  as  he  at  last  glanced 
up  at  her. 

"Clara,"  said  he,  "deny  it  if  you  can!  You 
have  ordered  the  trousseau^ 

She  gave  his  ear  a  little  pinch. 

"  Subject  to  your  approval,"  said  she. 

"You  have  written  to  the  Archbishop." 

"  It  is  not  posted  yet." 

"You  have  sent  a  note  to  Lord  Arthur." 

"  How  could  you  tell  that  %  " 

"  He  is  downstairs  now." 

"  No  ;  but  I  think  that  is  his  brougham." 

Lord  Charles  sank  back  with  a  look  of  half- 
comical  despair. 

"  Who  is  to  fight  against  such  a  woman  % "  he 
cried.  "Oh!  if  I  could  send  you  to  Novikoff ! 
He  is  too  much  for  any  of  my  men.  But,  Clara, 
I  cannot  have  them  up  here." 

"  Not  for  your  blessing  %  " 

"No,  no!" 

"  It  would  make  them  so  happy." 

"  I  cannot  stand  scenes." 

"  Then  I  shall  convey  it  to  them." 

"And  pray  say  no  more  about  it — to-day,  at 
any  rate.     I  have  been  weak  over  the  matter." 

"  Oh  !  Charlie,  you  who  are  so  strong  !  " 


A  QUESTION   OF   DIPLOMACY.  185 

"  You  have  outflanked  me,  Clara.  I  was  very 
well  done.     I  must  congratulate  you." 

"Well,"  she  murmured,  as  she  kissed  him, 
"  you  know  I  have  been  studying  a  very  clever 
diplomatist  for  thirty  years." 


13 


A  MEDICAL  DOCUMENT. 

Medical  men  are,  as  a  class,  very  mucli  too 
busy  to  take  stock  of  singular  situations  or  dra- 
matic events.  Thus  it  happens  that  the  ablest 
chronicler  of  their  experiences  in  our  literature 
was  a  lawyer.  A  life  spent  in  watching  over 
death-beds — or  over  bkth-beds  which  are  infin- 
itely more  trying — takes  something  from  a  man's 
sense  of  proportion,  as  constant  strong  waters 
might  corrupt  his  palate.  The  overstimulated 
nerve  ceases  to  respond.  Ask  the  surgeon  for  his 
best  experiences  and  he  may  reply  that  he  has 
seen  little  that  is  remarkable,  or  break  away  into 
the  technical.  But  catch  him  some  night  when 
the  fire  has  spurted  up  and  his  pipe  is  reeking, 
with  a  few  of  his  brother  practitioners  for  com- 
pany and  an  artful  question  or  allusion  to  set  him 
going.  Then  you  will  get  some  raw,  green  facts 
new  plucked  from  the  tree  of  life. 

It  is  after  one  of  the  quarterly  dinners  of  the 
Midland  Branch  of  the  British  Medical  Associ- 
ation.     Twenty    coffee    cups,    a    dozer    liqueur 


A  MEDICAL   DOCUMENT.  187 

glasses,  and  a  solid  bank  of  blue  smoke  which 
swirls  slowly  along  the  high,  gilded  ceiling  gives 
a  hint  of  a  successful  gathering.  But  the  mem- 
bers have  shredded  off  to  their  homes.  The  line 
of  heavy,  bulge-pocketed  overcoats  and  of  stetho- 
scope-bearing top  hats  is  gone  from  the  hotel  cor- 
ridor. Round  the  fire  in  the  sitting-room  three 
medicos  are  still  lingering,  however,  all  smoking 
and  arguing,  while  a  fourth,  who  is  a  mere  lay- 
man and  young  at  that,  sits  back  at  the  table. 
Under  cover  of  an  open  journal  he  is  writing  furi- 
ously with  a  stylographic  pen,  asking  a  question 
in  an  innocent  voice  from  time  to  time  and  so 
flickering  up  the  conversation  whenever  it  shows 
a  tendency  to  wane. 

The  three  men  are  all  of  that  staid  middle  age 
which  begins  early  and  lasts  late  in  the  profes- 
sion. They  are  none  of  them  famous,  yet  each  is 
of  good  repute,  and  a  fair  type  of  his  particular 
branch.  The  portly  man  with  the  authoritative 
manner  and  the  white,  vitriol  splash  upon  his 
cheek  is  Charley  Manson,  chief  of  the  Wormley 
Asylum,  and  author  of  the  brilliant  monograph — 
Obscure  Nervous  Lesions  in  the  Unmarried.  He 
always  wears  his  collar  high  like  that,  since  the 
half-successful  attempt  of  a  student  of  Revela- 
tions to  cut  his  throat  with  a  splinter  of  glass. 
The  second,  with  the  ruddy  face  and  the  merry 
brown  eyes,  is  a  general  practitioner,  a  man  of 


188  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

vast  experience,  wlio,  with  his  three  assistants 
and  his  five  horses,  takes  twenty-five  hundred  a 
year  in  half-crown  visits  and  shilling  consulta- 
tions out  of  the  poorest  quarter  of  a  great  city. 
That  cheery  face  of  Theodore  Foster  is  seen  at  the 
side  of  a  hundred  sick-beds  a  day,  and  if  he  has 
one-third  more  names  on  his  visiting  list  than  in 
his  cash  book  he  always  promises  himself  that  he 
will  get  level  some  day  when  a  millionaire  with  a 
chronic  complaint — the  ideal  combination- -shall 
seek  his  services.  The  third,  sitting  on  the  right 
with  his  dress  shoes  shining  on  the  top  of  the 
fender,  is  Hargrave,  the  rising  surgeon.  His  face 
has  none  of  the  broad  humanity  of  Theodore  Fos- 
ter's, the  eye  is  stern  and  critical,  the  mouth 
straight  and  severe,-but  there  is  strength  and  de- 
cision in  every  line  of  it,  and  it  is  nerve  rather 
than  sympathy  which  the  patient  demands  when 
he  is  bad  enough  to  come  to  Hargrave's  door.  He 
calls  himself  a  jawman  "a  mere  jawman "  as 
he  modestly  puts  it,  but  in  point  of  fact  he  is  too 
young  and  too  poor  to  confine  himself  to  a  spe- 
cialty, and  there  is  nothing  surgical  which  Har- 
grave has  not  the  skill  and  the  audacity  to  do. 

"Before,  after,  and  during,"  munnurs  the 
general  practitioner  in  answer  to  some  interpola- 
tion of  the  outsider's.  "I  assure  you,  Manson, 
one  sees  all  sorts  of  evanescent  forms  of  madness." 

"  Ah,  puerperal ! "  throw^s  in  the  other,  knock- 


A  MEDICAL   DOCUMENT.  189 

ing  the  curved  grey  ash  from  his  cigar.     "But 
you  had  some  case  in  your  mind,  Foster." 

"  Well,  there  was  only  one  last  week  which 
was  new  to  me.  I  had  been  engaged  by  some 
people  of  the  name  of  Silcoe.  When  the  trouble 
came  round  I  went  myself,  for  they  would  not 
hear  of  an  assistant.  The  husband  who  was  a 
policeman,  was  sitting  at  the  head  of  the  bed  on 
the  farther  side.  'This  won't  do,'  said  I.  'Oh 
yes,  doctor,  it  must  do,'  said  she.  'It's  quite 
irregular  and  he  must  go,'  said  I.  '  It's  that  or 
nothing,'  said  she.  'I  won't  open  my  mouth  or 
stir  a  finger  the  whole  night,'  said  he.  So  it 
ended  by  my  allowing  him  to  remain,  and  there 
he  sat  for  eight  hours  on  end.  She  was  very 
good  over  the  matter,  but  every  now  and  again  he 
would  fetch  a  hollow  groan,  and  I  noticed  that  he 
held  his  right  hand  just  under  the  sheet  all  the 
time,  where  I  had  no  doubt  that  it  was  clasped 
by  her  left.  When  it  was  all  happily  over,  I 
looked  at  him  and  his  face  was  the  colour  of  this 
cigar  ash,  and  his  head  had  dropped  on  to  the 
edge  of  the  pillow.  Of  course  I  thought  he  had 
fainted  with  emotion,  and  I  was  just  telling  my- 
self what  I  thought  of  myself  for  having  been 
such  a  fool  as  to  let  him  stay  there,  when  sud- 
denly I  saw  that  the  sheet  over  his  hand  was  all 
soaked  with  blood  ;  I  whisked  it  down,  and  there 
was  the  fellow's    wrist  half  cut  through.      The 


190  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

woman  had  one  bracelet  of  a  policeman's  handcuff 
over  her  left  wrist  and  the  other  round  his  right 
one.  When  she  had  been  in  pain  she  had  twisted 
with  all  her  strength  and  the  iron  had  fairly  eaten 
into  the  bone  of  the  man's  arm.  'Aye,  doctor,' 
said  she,  when  she  saw  I  had  noticed  it.  'He's 
got  to  take  his  share  as  well  as  me.  Turn  and 
turn,'  said  she." 

"Don't  you  find  it  a  very  wearing  branch  of 
the  profession  ? "  asks  Foster  after  a  pause. 

"My  dear  fellow,  it  was  the  fear  of  it  that 
drove  me  into  lunacy  work." 

"Aye,  and  it  has  driven  men  into  asylums  who 
never  found  their  way  on  to  the  medical  staff.  I 
was  a  very  shy  fellow  myself  as  a  student,  and  I 
know  what  it  means." 

"No  joke  that  in  general  practice,"  says  the 
alienist. 

"Well,  you  hear  men  talk  about  it  as  though 
it  were,  but  I  tell  you  it's  much  nearer  tragedy. 
Take  some  poor,  raw,  young  fellow  who  has  just 
put  up  his  plate  in  a  strange  town.  He  has  found 
it  a  trial  all  his  life,  perhaps,  to  talk  to  a  woman 
about  lawn  tennis  and  church  services.  When  a 
young  man  is  shy  he  is  shyer  than  any  girl. 
Then  down  comes  an  anxious  mother  and  consults 
him  upon  the  most  intimate  family  matters.  '  I 
shall  never  go  to  that  doctor  again,'  says  she 
afterwards.     '  His  manner  is  so  stiff  and  unsym- 


A  MEDICAL  DOCUMENT.  191 

pathetic'  Unsympathetic  !  Why,  the  poor  lad 
was  struck  dumb  and  paralysed.  I  have  known 
general  practitioners  Avho  were  so  shy  that  they 
could  not  bring  themselves  to  ask  the  way  in  the 
street.  Fancy  what  sensitive  men  like  that  must 
endure  before  they  get  broken  in  to  medical  prac- 
tice. And  then  they  know  that  nothing  is  so 
catching  as  shyness,  and  that  if  they  do  not  keep 
a  face  of  stone,  their  patient  will  be  covered  with 
confusion.  And  so  they  keep  their  face  of  stone, 
and  earn  the  reputation  perhaps  of  having  a  heart 
to  correspond.  I  suppose  nothing  would  shake 
your  nerve,  Manson." 

"Well,  when  a  man  lives  year  in  year  out 
among  a  thousand  lunatics,  with  a  fair  sprinkling 
of  homicidals  among  them,  one's  nerves  either  get 
set  or  shattered.     Mine  are  all  right  so  far." 

"I  was  frightened  once,"  says  the  surgeon. 
"  It  was  when  I  was  doing  dispensary  work.  One 
night  I  had  a  call  from  some  very  poor  people, 
and  gathered  from  the  few  words  they  said  that 
their  child  was  ill.  When  I  entered  the  room  I 
saw  a  small  cradle  in  the  corner.  Raising  the 
lamp  I  walked  over  and  putting  back  the  curtains 
I  looked  down  at  the  baby.  I  tell  you  it  was 
sheer  Providence  that  I  didn't  drop  that  lamp  and 
set  the  whole  place  alight.  The  head  on  the  pil- 
low turned  and  I  saw  a  face  looking  up  at  me 
which  seemed  to  me  to  have  more  malignancy  and 


192  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

wickedness  than  ever  I  had  dreamed  of  in  a  night- 
mare. It  was  the  flush  of  red  over  the  cheek- 
bones, and  the  brooding  eyes  full  of  loathing  of 
me,  and  of  everything  else,  that  impressed  me. 
I'll  never  forget  my  start  as,  instead  of  the  chubby 
face  of  an  infafat,  my  eyes  fell  upon  this  creature. 
I  took  the  mother  into  the  next  room.  'What  is 
it?'  I  asked.  'A  girl  of  sixteen,'  said  she,  and 
then  throwing  up  her  arms,  'Oh,  pray  God  she 
may  be  taken ! '  The  poor  thing,  though  she 
spent  her  life  in  this  little  cradle,  had  great, 
long,  thin  limbs  which  she  curled  up  under  her. 
I  lost  sight  of  the  case  and  don't  know  what 
became  of  it,  but  I'll  never  forget  the  look  in 
her  eyes." 

"That's  creepy,"  says  Dr.  Foster.  "But  I 
think  one  of  my  experiences  would  run  it  close. 
Shortly  after  I  put  up  my  plate  I  had  a  visit  from 
a  little  hunch-backed  woman  who  wished  me  to 
come  and  attend  to  her  sister  in  her  trouble. 
When  I  reached  the  house,  which  was  a  very 
poor  one,  I  found  two  other  little  hunched-backed 
women,  exactly  like  the  first,  Avaiting  for  me  in 
the  sitting-room.  'Not  one  of  them  said  a  word, 
but  my  companion  took  the  lamj)  and  walked  up- 
stairs with  her  two  sisters  behind  her,  and  me 
bringing  up  the  rear.  I  can  see  those  three  queer 
shadows  cast  by  the  lamp  upon  the  wall  as  clearly 
as  I  can  see  that  tobacco  pouch.     In  the  room 


A   MEDICAL   DOCUMENT.  193 

above  was  the  fourth  sister,  a  remarkably  beau- 
tiful girl  in  evident  need  of  my  assistance.  There 
was  no  wedding  ring  upon  her  finger.  The  three 
deformed  sisters  seated  themselves  round  the 
room,  like  so  many  graven  images,  and  all  night 
not  one  of  them  opened  her  mouthy-  I'm  not  ro- 
mancing, Hargrave  ;  this  is  absolute^act.  In  the 
early  morning  a  fearful  thunderstorm  broke  out, 
one  of  the  most  violent  I  have  ever  known.  The 
little  garret  burned  blue  wdth  the  lightning,  and 
thunder  roared  and  rattled  as  if  it  were  on  the 
very  roof  of  the  house.  It  wasn't  much  of  a  lamp 
I  had,  and  it  was  a  queer  thing  when  a  spurt  of 
lightning  came  to  see  those  three  twisted  figures 
sitting  round  the  walls,  or  to  have  the  voice  of 
my  patient  drowned  by  the  booming  of  the  thun- 
der. By  Jove  I  I  don't  mind  telling  you  that  there 
was  a  time  when  I  nearly  bolted  from  the  room. 
All  came  right  in  the  end,  but  I  never  heard  the 
true  story  of  the  unfortunate  beauty  and  her 
three  crippled  sisters." 

"That's  the  worst  of  these  medical  stories," 
sighs  the  outsider.  "They  never  seem  to  have 
an  end. " 

''When  a  man  is  up  to  his  neck  in  practice, 
my  boy,  he  has  no  time  to  gratify  his  private 
curiosity.  Things  shoot  across  him  and  he  gets  a 
glimpse  of  them,  only  to  recall  them,  perhaps,  at 
some  quiet  moment  like  this.     But  I've  always 


X94  ROUND  THE  RED   LAMP. 

felt,  Manson,  that  your  line  had  as  much  of  the 
terrible  in  it  as  any  other." 

"More,"  groans  the  alienist.  "A  disease  of 
the  body  is  bad  enough,  but  this  seems  to  be  a 
disease  of  the  soul.  Is  it  not  a  shocking  thing — 
a  thing  to  drive  a  reasoning  man  into  absolute 
Materialism — to  think  that  you  may  have  a  fine, 
noble  fellow  with  every  divine  instinct  and  that 
some  little  vascular  change,  the  dropping,  we  will 
say,  of  a  minute  spicule  of  bone  from  the  inner 
table  of  his  skull  on  to  the  surface  of  his  brain 
may  have  the  effect  of  changing  him  to  a  filthy 
and  pitiable  creature  with  every  low  and  debasing 
tendency  ?  What  a  satire  an  asylum  is  upon  the 
majesty  of  man,  and  no  less  upon  the  ethereal 
nature  of  the  soul." 

"  Faith  and  hope,"  murmurs  the  general  prac- 
titioner. 

"  I  have  no  faith,  not  much  hope,  and  all  the 
charity  I  can  afford,"  says  the  surgeon.  "When 
theology  squares  itself  with  the  facts  of  life  I'll 
read  it  up." 

"  You  were  talking  about  cases,"  says  the  out- 
sider, jerking  the  ink  down  into  his  stylographic 
pen. 

"Well,  take  a  common  complaint  which  kills 
many  thousands  every  year,  like  G.  P.  for  in- 
stance." 

"  What's  G.  P.?" 


A   MEDICAL   DOCUMENT.  I95 

"General  practitioner,"  suggests  the  surgeon 
with  a  grin. 

"The  British  public  will  have  to  know  what 
G.  P.  is," says  the  alienist  gravely.  "It's  increas- 
ing by  leaps  and  bounds,  and  it  has  the  distinc- 
tion of  being  absolutely  incurable.  General  paral- 
ysis is  its  full  title,  and  I  tell  you  it  promises  to 
be  a  perfect  scourge.  Here's  a  fairly  typical  case 
now  which  I  saw  last  Monday  week.  A  young 
farmer,  a  splendid  fellow,  surprised  his  fellows  by 
taking  a  very  rosy  view  of  things  at  a  time  when 
the  whole  country-side  was  grumbling.  He  was 
going  to  give  up  wheat,  give  up  arable  land,  too, 
if  it  didn't  pay,  plant  two  thousand  acres  of  rho- 
dodendrons and  get  a  monopoly  of  the  su])ply  for 
Covent  Garden — there  was  no  end  to  his  schemes, 
all  sane  enough  but  just  a  bit  inflated.  I  called 
at  the  farm,  not  to  see  him,  but  on  an  altogether 
different  matter.  Something  about  the  man's  way 
of  talking  struck  me  and  I  watched  him  narrowly. 
His  lip  had  a  trick  of  quivering,  his  words  slurred 
themselves  together,  and  so  did  his  handwriting 
when  he  had  occasion  to  dfAw.  up  a  small  agree- 
ment. A  closer  inspection  showed  me  that  one  of 
his  pupils  was  ever  so  little  larger  than  the  other. 
As  I  left  the  house  his  wife  came  after  me. 
'Isn't  it  splendid  to  see  Job  looking  so  well, 
doctor,'  said  she;  'he's  that  full  of  energy  he 
can  hardly  keep  himself  quiet.'    I  did  not  say 


196  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

anything,  for  I  had  not  the  heart,  but  I  knew  that 
the  fellow  was  as  much  condemned  to  death  as 
though  he  were  lying  in  the  cell  at  K"ewgate.  It 
was  a  characteristic  case  of  incipient  G.  P." 

"  Good  heavens  !  "  cries  the  outsider.  My  own 
lips  tremble.  I  often  slur  my  words.  I  believe 
I've  got  it  myself." 

Three  little  chuckles  come  from  the  front  of 
the  fire. 

"  There's  the  danger  of  a  little  medical  knowl- 
edge to  the  layman." 

"A  great  authority  has  said  that  every  first 
year's  student  is  suffering  in  silent  agony  from 
four  diseases,"  remarks  the  surgeon.  "One  is 
heart  disease,  of  course  ;  another  is  cancer  of  the 
parotid,     I  forget  the  two  other. " 

"  Where  does  the  parotid  come  in  ? " 

''Oh,  it's  the  last  wisdom  tooth  coming 
through  I " 

"And  what  would  be  the  end  of  that  young 
farmer  ? "  asks  the  outsider. 

"Paresis  of  all  the  muscles,  ending  in  fits, 
coma,  and  death.  It  may  be  a  few  months,  it 
may  be  a  ye^r  or  two.  He  was  a  very  strong 
young  man  and  would  take  some  killing." 

"By- the- way,"  says  the  alienist,  "did  I  ever 
tell  you  about  the  first  certificate  I  signed  ?  I 
came  as  near  ruin  then  as  a  man  could  go." 

"  What  was  it,  then  ?  " 


A   MEDICAL   DOCUMENT.  197 

"  I  was  in  practice  at  the  time.  One  morning 
a  Mrs.  Cooper  called  upon  me  and  informed  me 
that  her  husband  had  shown  signs  of  delusions 
lately.  They  took  the  form  of  imagining  that  he 
had  been  in  the  army  and  had  distinguished  him- 
self very  much.  As  a  matter  of  fact  he  was 
a  lawyer  and  had  never  been  out  of  England. 
Mrs.  Cooper  was  of  opinion  that  if  I  were  to  call 
it  might  alarm  him,  so  it  was  agreed  between  us 
that  she  should  send  him  up  in  the  evening  on 
some  pretext  to  my  consulting-room,  which  would 
give  me  the  opportunity  of  having  a  chat  with 
him  and,  if  I  were  convinced  of  his  insanity,  of 
signing  his  certificate.  Another  doctor  had  al- 
ready signed,  so  that  it  only  needed  my  concur- 
rence to  have  him  placed  under  treatment.  Well, 
Mr.  Cooper  arrived  in  the  evening  about  half  an 
hour  before  I  had  expected  him,  and  consulted 
me  as  to  some  malarious  symptoms  from  which  he 
said  that  he  suffered.  According  to  his  account 
he  had  just  returned  from  the  Abyssinian  Cam- 
paign, and  had  been  one  of  the  first  of  the  British 
forces  to  enter  Magdala.  No  delusion  could  pos- 
sibly be  more  marked,  for  he  would  talk  of  little 
else,  so  I  filled  in  the  papers  without  the  slightest 
hesitation.  When  his  wife  arrived,  after  he  had 
left,  I  put  some  questions  to  her  to  complete  the 
form.  'What  is  his  age?'  I  asked.  'Fifty,' 
said   she.     '  Fifty  ! '    I  cried.     '  Why,  the  man  I 


198  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

examined  could  not  have  been  more  than  thirty  ! ' 
And  so  it  came  out  that  the  real  Mr.  Cooper  had 
never  called  upon  me  at  all,  but  that  by  one  of 
those  coincidences  which  take  a  man's  breath  away 
another  Cooper,  who  really  was  a  very  distin- 
guished young  officer  of  artillery,  had  come  in  to 
consult  me.  My  pen  was  wet  to  sign  the  paper 
when  I  discovered  it,"  says  Dr.  Manson,  mopping 
his  forehead. 

"  We  were  talking  about  nerve  just  now,"  ob- 
serves the  surgeon.  "Just  after  my  qualifying 
I  served  in  the  Navy  for  a  time,  as  I  think  you 
know.  I  was  on  the  flag-ship  on  the  West  African 
Station,  and  I  remember  a  singular  example  of 
nerve  which  came  to  my  notice  at  that  time.  One 
of  our  small  gunboats  had  gone  up  the  Calabar 
river,  and  while  there  the  surgeon  died  of  coast 
fever.  On  the  same  day  a  man's  leg  was  broken 
by  a  spar  falling  upon  it,  and  it  became  quite 
obvious  that  it  must  be  taken  off,  above  the  knee 
if  his  life  was  to  be  saved.  The  young  lieutenant 
who  was  in  charge  of  the  craft  searched  among 
the  dead  doctor's  effects  and  laid  his  hands  upon 
some  chloroform,  a  hip-joint  knife,  and  a  volume 
of  Grey's  Anatomy.  He  had  the  man  laid  by  the 
steward  upon  the  cabin  table,  and  with  a  picture 
of  a  cross  section  of  the  thigh  in  front  of  him  he 
began  to  take  off  the  limb.  Every  now  and  then, 
referring  to  the  diagram,  he  would  say  :  '  Stand 


A  MEDICAL  DOCUMENT.  199 

by  with  the  lashings,  steward.  There's  blood  on 
the  chart  about  here.'  Then  he  would  jab  with 
his  knife  until  he  cut  the  artery,  and  he  and  his 
assistant  would  tie  it  up  before  they  went  any 
further.  In  this  way  they  gradually  whittled  the 
leg  off,  and  upon  my  word  they  made  a  very  ex- 
cellent job  of  it.  The  man  is  hopping  about  the 
Portsmouth  Hard  at  this  day. 

"  It's  no  joke  when  the  doctor  of  one  of  these 
isolated  gunboats  himself  falls  ill,"  continues  the 
surgeon  after  a  pause.  "You  might  think  it  easy 
for  him  to  prescribe  for  himself,  but  this  fever 
knocks  you  down  like  a  club,  and  you  haven't 
strength  left  to  brush  a  mosquito  off  your  face.  I 
had  a  touch  of  it  at  Lagos,  and  I  know  what  I  am 
telling  you.  But  there  was  a  chum  of  mine  who 
really  had  a  curious  experience.  The  whole  crew 
gave  him  up,  and,  as  they  had  never  had  a  funeral 
aboard  the  ship,  they  began  rehearsing  the  forms 
so  as  to  be  ready.  They  thought  that  he  was  un- 
conscious, but  he  swears  he  could  hear  every  word 
that  passed.  '  Corpse  comin'  up  the  'atchway  ! ' 
cried  the  Cockney  sergeant  of  Marines.  '  Present 
harms ! '  He  was  so  amused,  and  so  indignant 
too,  that  he  just  made  up  his  mind  that  he 
wouldn't  be  carried  |hrough  that  hatchway,  and 
he  wasn't,  either." 

"  There's  no  need  for  fiction  in  medicine,"  re- 
marks Foster,  "for  the  facts  will  always  beat  any- 


200  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

thing  you  can  fancy.  But  it  has  seemed- to  me 
sometimes  that  a  curious  paper  might  be  read  at 
some  of  these  meetings  about  the  uses  of  medicine 
in  popular  fiction." 

"How?" 

"Well,  of  what  the  folk  die  of,  a:gid  what 
diseases  are  made  most  use  of  in  novels.  Some 
are  worn  to  pieces,  and  others,  which  are  equally 
common  in  real  life,  are  never  mentioned.  Ty- 
phoid is  fairly  frequent,  but  scarlet  fever  is  un- 
known. Heart  disease  is  common,  but  then  heart 
disease,  as  we  know  it,  is  usually  the  sequel  of 
some  foregoing  disease,  of  which  we  never  hear 
anything  in  the  romance.  Then  there  is  the  mys- 
terious malady  called  brain  fever,  which  always 
attacks  the  heroine  after  a  crisis,  but  which  is  un- 
known under  that  name  to  the  text  books.  Peo- 
ple when  they  are  over-excited  in  novels  fall  down 
in  a  fit.  In  a  fairly  large  experience  I  have  never 
known  anyone  do  so  in  real  life.  The  small  com- 
plaints simply  don't  exist.  Nobody  ever  gets 
shingles  or  quinsy,  or  mumps  in  a  novel.  All  the 
diseases,  too,  belong  to  the  upper  part  of  the 
body.     The  novelist  never  strikes  below  the  belt. " 

"I'll  tell  you  what,  Foster,"  says  the  alienist, 
"  there  is  a  side  of  life  which  is  too  medical  for 
the  general  public  and  too  romantic  for  the  pro- 
fessional journals,  but  which  contains  some  of  the 
richest  human  materials  that  a  man  could  study. 


A   MEDICAL   DOCUMENT.  201 

It's  not  a  pleasant  side,  I  am  afraid,  but  if  it  is 
good  enough  for  Providence  to  create,  it  is  good 
enough  for  us  to  try  and  understand.  It  would 
deal  with  strange  outbursts  of  savagery  and  vice 
in  the  lives  of  the  best  men,  curious  momentary 
weaknesses  in  the  record  of  the  sweetest  women, 
known  but  to  one  or  two,  and  inconceivable  to  the 
world  around.  It  would  deal,  too,  with  the 
singular  phenomena  of  waxing  and  of  waning 
manhood,  and  would  throw  a  light  upon  those 
actions  which  have  cut  short  many  an  honoured 
career  and  sent  a  man  to  a  prison  when  he  should 
have  been  hurried  to  a  consulting-room.  Of  all 
evils  that  may  come  upon  the  sons  of  men,  God 
shield  us  principally  from  that  one  !  " 

"  I  had  a  case  some  little  time  ago  which  was 
out  of  the  ordinary,"  says  the  surgeon.  "There's 
a  famous  beauty  in  London  society — I  mention  no 
names — who  used  to  be  remarkable  a  few  seasons 
ago  for  the  very  low  dresses  which  she  would 
wear.  She  had  the  whitest  of  skins  and  most 
beautiful  of  shoulders,  so  it  was  no  wonder. 
Then  gradually  the  frilling  at  her  neck  lapped 
upwards  and  upwards,  until  last  year  she  aston- 
ished everyone  by  wearing  quite  a  high  collar  at 
a  time  when  it  was  completely  out  of  fashion. 
Well,  one  day  this  very  woman  was  shown  into 
my  consulting-room.  When  the  footman  was 
gone  she  suddenly  tore  off  the  upper  part  of  her 

14 


202  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

dress.  '  For  God's  sake  do  something  for  me  ! ' 
she  cried.  Then  I  saw  what  the  trouble  was.  A 
rodent  ulcer  was  eating  its  way  upwards,  coiling 
on  in  its  serpiginous  fashion  until  the  end  of  it  was 
flush  with  her  collar.  The  red  streak  of  its  trail 
was  lost  below  the  line  of  her  bust.  Year  by  year 
it  had  ascended  and  she  had  heightened  her  dress 
to  hide  it,  until  now  it  was  about  to  invade  her 
face.  She  had  been  too  i:)roud  to  confess  her 
trouble,  even  to  a  medical  man." 

"And  did  you  stop  it?" 

"Well,  with  zinc  chloride  I  did  what  I  could. 
But  it  may  break  out  again.  She  was  one  of 
those  beautiful  white-nnd-pink  creatures  who  are 
rotten  with  struma.  You  may  patch  but  you 
can't  mend." 

"  Dear  !  dear  !  dear  !  "  cries  the  general  prac- 
titioner, with  that  kindly  softening  of  the  eyes 
which  had  endeared  him  to  so  many  thousands. 
"I  suppose  we  mustn't  think  ourselves  wiser  than 
Providence,  but  there  are  times  when  one  feels 
that  spme thing  is  wrong  in  the  scheme  of  things. 
I've  seen  some  sad  things  in  my  life.  Did  I  ever 
tell  you  that  case  where  Nature  divorced  a  most 
loving  ccuple?  He  was  a  fine  young  fellow,  an 
athlete  and  a  gentleman,  but  he  overdid  athletics. 
You  know  how  the  force  that  controls  us  gives  us 
a  little  tweak  to  remind  us  when  we  get  off  the 
beaten  track.     It  may  be  a  pinch  on  the  great  toe 


A   MEDICAL  DOCUMENT.  203 

if  we  drink  too  much  and  work  too  little.  Or  it 
may  be  a  tug  on  our  nerves  if  we  dissipate  energy 
too  much.  With  the  athlete,  of  course,  it's  the 
heart  or  the  lungs.  He  had  bad  phthisis  and  was 
sent  to  Davos.  Well,  as  luck  would  have  it,  she 
developed  rheumatic  fever,  which  left  her  heart 
very  much  affected.  Now,  do  you  see  the  dread- 
ful dilemma  in  which  those  poor  people  found 
themselves  ?  When  he  came  below  four  thousand 
feet  or  so,  his  symptoms  became  terrible.  She 
could  come  up  about  twenty-five  hundred  and 
then  her  heart  reached  its  limit.  They  had  sev- 
eral interviews  half  way  down  the  valley,  which 
left  them  nearly  dead,  and  at  last,  the  doctors 
had  to  absolutely  forbid  it.  And  so  for  four 
years  they  lived  within  three  miles  of  each  other 
and  never  met.  Every  morning  he  would  go  to  a 
place  which  overlooked  the  chalet  in  which  she 
lived  and  would  wave  a  great  white  cloth  and  she 
answer  from  below.  They  could  see  each  other 
quite  plainly  with  their  field  glasses,  and  they 
might  have  been  in  different  planets  for  all  their 
chance  of  meeting." 

"And  one  at  last  died,"  says  the  outsider. 

"No,  sir.  I'm  sorry  not  to  be  able  to  clinch 
the  story,  but  the  man  recovered  and  is  now  a 
successful  stockbroker  in  Drapers  Gardens.  The 
woman,  too,  is  the  mother  of  a  considerable  fam- 
ily.    But  what  are  you  doing  there  ?  " 


204  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

"  Only  taking  a  note  or  two  of  your  talk." 
The  three  medical  men  laugh  as  they  walk 

towards  their  overcoats. 

"Why,  we've  done  nothing  but  talk  shop," 

says  the  general  practitioner.      "What  possible 

interest  can  the  public  take  in  that  ? " 


LOT  NO.   249. 

Of  the  dealings  of  Edward  Bellingham  with 
William  Monkhouse  Lee,  and  of  the  cause  of  the 
great  terror  of  Abercrombie  Smith,  it  may  be  that 
no  absolute  and  final  judgment  will  ever  be  deliv- 
ered. It  is  true  that  we  have  the  full  and  clear 
narrative  of  Smith  himself,  and  such  corrobora- 
tion as  he  could  look  for  from  Thomas  Styles  the 
servant,  from  the  Reverend  Plumptree  Peterson, 
Fellow  of  Old's,  and  from  such  other  people  as 
chanced  to  gain  some  passing  glance  at  this  or 
that  incident  in  a  singular  chain  of  events.  Yet, 
in  the  main,  the  story  must  rest  upon  Smith 
alone,  and  the  most  will  think  that  it  is  more 
likely  that  one  brain,  however  outwardly  sane, 
has  some  subtle  warp  in  its  texture,  some  strange 
flaw  in  its  workings,  than  that  the  path  of  Nature 
has  been  overstepped  in  open  day  in  so  famed  a 
centre  of  learning  and  light  as  the  University  of 
Oxford.  Yet  when  we  think  how  narrow  and 
how  devious  this  path  of  Nature  is,  how  dimly 
we  can  trace  it,  for  all  our  lamps  of  science,  and 

(205) 


206  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

how  from  the  darkness  which  girds  it  round  great 
and  terrible  possibilities  loom  ever  shadowly  up- 
wards, it  is  a  bold  and  confident  man  who  will  put 
a  limit  to  the  strange  by-paths  into  which  the 
human  spirit  may  wander. 

In  a  certain  wing  of  what  we  will  call  Old  Col- 
lege in  Oxford  there  is  a  corner  turret  of  an  ex- 
ceeding great  age.  The  heavy  arch  which  spans 
the  open  door  has  bent  downwards  in  the  centre 
under  the  weight  of  its  years,  and  the  grey, 
lichen-blotched  blocks  of  stone  are  bound  and 
knitted  together  with  withes  and  strands  of  ivy, 
as  though  the  old  mother  had  set  herself  to  brace 
them  up  against  wind  and  weather.  From  the 
door  a  stone  stair  curves  upward  spirally,  pass- 
ing two  landings,  and  terminating  in  a  third 
one,  its  steps  all  shapeless  and  hollowed  by  the 
tread  of  so  many  generations  of  the  seekers  after 
knowledge.  Life  has  flowed  like  water  down  this 
winding  stair,  and,  waterlike,  has  left  these 
smooth-worn  grooves  behind  it.  From  the  long- 
gowned,  pedantic  scholars  of  Plantagenet  days 
down  to  the  young  bloods  of  a  later  age,  how  full 
and  strong  had  been  that  tide  of  young  English 
life.  And  what  was  left  now  of  all  those  hopes, 
those  strivings,  those  fiery  energies,  save  here 
and  there  in  some  old-world  churchyard  a  few 
scratches  upon  a  stone,  and  perchance  a  handful 
of  dust  iu  a  mouldering  coffin  ?    Yet  here  were 


LOT  NO.  249.  207 

the  silent  stair  and  the  grey  old  wall,  with  bend 
and  saltire  and  many  another  heraldic  device  still 
to  be  read  upon  its  surface,  like  grotesque  shad- 
ows thrown  back  from  the  days  that  had  passed. 

In  the  month  of  May,  in  the  year  1884,  three 
young  men  occupied  the  sets  of  rooms  which 
opened  on  to  the  separate  landings  of  the  old 
stair.  Each  set  consisted  simply  of  a  sitting- 
room  and  of  a  bedroom,  while  the  two  corre- 
sponding rooms  upon  the  ground-floor  were  used, 
the  one  as  a  coal- cellar,  and  the  other  as  the  liv- 
ing-room of  the  servant,  or  gyp,  Thomas  Styles, 
whose  duty  it  was  to  wait  upon  the  three  men 
above  him.  To  right  and  to  left  was  a  line  of  lec- 
ture-rooms and  of  offices,  so  that  the  dwellers  in 
the  old  turret  enjoyed  a  certain  seclusion,  which 
made  the  chambers  popular  among  the  more 
studious  undergraduates.  Such  were  the  three 
who  occupied  them  now — Abercrombie  Smith 
above,  Edward  Bellingham  beneath  him,  and 
William  Monkhouse  Lee  upon  the  lowest  storey. 

It  was  ten  o'clock  on  a  bright  spring  night, 
and  Abercrombie  Smith  lay  back  in  his  arm-chair, 
his  feet  upon  the  fender,  and  his  briar-root  pipe 
between  his  lips.  In  a  similar  chair,  and  equally 
at  his  ease,  there  lounged  on  the  other  side  of  the 
fireplace  his  old  school  friend  Jephro  Hastie. 
Both  men  were  in  flannels,  for  they  had  spent 
their  evening  upon  the  river,  but  apart  from  their 


208  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

dress  no  one  could  look  at  their  hard-cut,-  alert 
faces  without  seeing  that  they  were  open-air  men 
— men  whose  minds  and  tastes  turned  naturally 
to  all  that  was  manly  and  robust.  Hastie,  in- 
deed, was  stroke  of  his  college  boat,  and  Smith 
was  an  even  better  oar,  but  a  coming  examination 
had  already  cast  its  shadow  over  him  and  held 
him  to  his  work,  save  for  the  few  hours  a  week 
which  health  demanded.  A  litter  of  medical 
books  upon  the  table,  with  scattered  bones,  mod- 
els and  anatomical  plates,  pointed  to  the  extent 
as  well  as  the  nature  of  his  studies,  while  a  couple 
of  single-sticks  and  a  set  of  boxing-gloves  above 
the  mantelpiece  hinted  at  the  means  by  which, 
with  Hastie's  help,  he  might  take  his  exercise  in 
its  most  compressed  and  least  distant  form.  They 
knew  each  other  very  well — so  well  that  they 
could  sit  now  in  that  soothing  silence  which  is  the 
very  highest  development  of  companionshi]3. 

"  Have  some  whisky,"  said  Abercrombie  Smith 
at  last  between  two  cloudbursts.  "  Scotch  in  the 
jug  and  Irish  in  the  bottle." 

"No,  thanks.  I'm  in  for  the  sculls.  I  don't 
liquor  when  I'm  training.     How  about  you  ? " 

"  I'm  reading  hard.  I  think  it  best  to  leave  it 
alone." 

Hastie  nodded,  and  they  relapsed  into  a  con- 
tented silence. 

"  By-the-way,  Smith,"  asked  Hastie,  presently, 


LOT  NO.  249.  209 

"  have  you  made  the  acquaintance  of  either  of  the 
fellows  on  your  stair  yet  ?  " 

"  Just  a  nod  when  we  pass.     Nothing  more." 

"  Hum  !  I  should  be  inclined  to  let  it  stand 
at  that.  I  know  something  of  them  both.  Not 
much,  but  as  much  as  I  want.  I  don't  think  I 
should  take  them  to  my  bosom  if  I  were  you. 
Not  that  there's  much  amiss  with  Monkhouse 
Lee." 

"  Meaning  the  thin  one  ?  " 

"  Precisely.  He  is  a  gentlemanly  little  fellow. 
I  don't  think  there  is  any  vice  in  him.  But  then 
you  can't  know  him  without  knowing  Belling- 
ham." 

"  Meaning  the  fat  one  ?  " 

"  Yes,  the  fat  one.  And  he's  a  man  whom  I, 
for  one,  would  rather  not  know." 

Abercrombie  Smith  raised  his  eyebrows  and 
glanced  across  at  his  companion. 

"What's  up,  then?"  he  asked.  "Drink? 
Cards  ?    Cad  ?    You  used  not  to  be  censorious." 

"Ah!  you  evidently  don't  know  the  man,  or 
you  wouldn't  ask.  There's  something  damnable 
about  him — something  reptilian.  My  gorge  al- 
ways rises  at  him.  I  should  put  him  down  as  a 
man  with  secret  vices — an  evil  liver.  He's  no 
fool,  though.  They  say  that  he  is  one  of  the 
best  men  in  his  line  that  they  have  ever  had  in 
the  college." 


210  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

"  Medicine  or  classics  ? " 

"Eastern  languages.  He's  a  demon  at  them. 
Chillingworth  met  him  somewhere  above  the  sec- 
ond cataract  last  long,  and  he  told  me  that  he  just 
prattled  to  the  Arabs  as  if  he  had  been  born  and 
nursed  and  weaned  among  them.  He  talked  Cop- 
tic to  the  Copts,  and  Hebrew  to  the  Jews,  and 
Arabic  to  the  Bedouins,  and  they  were  all  ready 
to  kiss  the  hem  of  his  frock-coat.  There  are 
some  old  hermit  Johnnies  up  in  those  parts  who 
sit  on  rocks  and  scowl  and  spit  at  the  casual 
stranger.  Well,  when  they  saw  this  chap  Belling- 
ham,  before  he  had  said  five  words  they  just  lay 
down  on  their  bellies  and  wriggled.  Chilling- 
worth  said  that  he  never  saw  anything  like  it. 
Bellingham  seemed  to  take  it  as  his  right,  too, 
and  strutted  about  among  them  and  talked  down 
to  them  like  a  Dutch  uncle.  Pretty  good  for  an 
undergrad.  of  Old's,  wasn't  it  ? " 

"Why  do  you  say  you  can't  know  Lee  with- 
out knowing  Bellingham  ? " 

"Because  Bellingham  is  engaged  to  his  sister 
Eveline.  Such  a  bright  little  girl,  Smith  !  I  know 
the  whole  family  well.  It's  disgusting  to  see  that 
brute  with  her.  A  toad  and  a  dove,  that's  what 
they  always  remind  me  of." 

Abercrombie  Smith  grinned  and  knocked  his 
ashes  out  against  the  side  of  the  grate. 

"You  show  every  card   in   your   hand,   old 


LOT  NO.  249.  211 

chap,"  said  he.  "  What  a  prejudiced,  green-eyed, 
evil-thinking  old  man  it  is  !  You  have  really 
nothing  against  the  fellow  except  that." 

"Well,  I've  known  her  ever  since  she  was  as 
long  as  that  cherry-wood  pipe,  and  I  don't  like  to 
see  her  taking  risks.  And  it  is  a  risk.  He  looks 
beastly.  And  he  has  a  beastly  temper,  a  venom- 
ous temper.  You  remember  his  row  with  Long 
Norton  ?  " 

"No;  you  always  forget  that  I  am  a  fresh- 
man." 

"Ah,  it  was  last  winter.  Of  course.  Well, 
you  know  the  towpath  along  by  the  river.  There 
were  several  fellows  going  along  it,  Bellingham  in 
front,  when  they  came  on  an  old  market-woman 
coming  the  other  way.  It  had  been  raining — you 
know  what  those  fields  are  like  when  it  has  rained 
— and  the  path  ran  betAveen  the  river  and  a  great 
puddle  that  was  nearly  as  broad.  Well,  what 
does  this  swine  do  but  keep  the  path,  and  push 
the  old  girl  into  the  mud,  where  she  and  her 
marketings  came  to  terrible  grief.  It  was  a  black- 
guard thing  to  do,  and  Long  Norton,  who  is  as 
gentle  a  fellow  as  ever  stepped,  told  him  what 
he  thought  of  it.  One  word  led  to  another,  and 
it  ended  in  Norton  laying  his  stick  across  the 
fellow's  shoulders.  There  was  the  deuce  of  a 
fuss  about  it,  and  it's  a  treat  to  see  the  way  in 
which  Bellingham  looks   at  Norton  when  they 


212  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

meet  now.      By  Jove,  Smith,  it's  nearly  eleven 
o'clock ! " 

"  No  hurry.  Light  your  pipe  again." 
"Not  I.  I'm  supposed  to  be  in  training. 
Here  I've  been  sitting  gossiping  when  I  ought  to 
have  been  safely  tucked  up.  I'll  borrow  your 
skull,  if  you  can  share  it.  Williams  has  had 
mine  for  a  month.  I'll  take  the  little  bones  of 
your  ear,  too,  if  you  are  sure  you  won't  need 
them.  Thanks  very  much.  Never  mind  a  bag, 
I  can  carry  them  very  well  under  my  arm. 
Good-night,  my  son,  and  take  my  tip  as  to 
your  neighbour." 

When  Hastie,  bearing  his  anatomical  plunder, 
had  clattered  off  down  the  winding  stair,  Aber- 
crombie  Smith  hurled  his  pipe  into  the  waste- 
paper  basket,  and  drawing  his  chair  nearer  to  the 
lamp,  plunged  into  a  formidable  green-covered 
volume,  adorned  with  great  coloured  maps  of  that 
strange  internal  kingdom  of  which  we  are  the 
hapless  and  helpless  monarchs.  Though  a  fresh- 
man at  Oxford,  the  student  was  not  so  in  medi- 
cine, for  he  had  worked  for  four  years  at  Glasgow 
and  at  Berlin,  and  this  coming  examination  would 
place  him  finally  as  a  member  of  his  profession. 
With  his  firm  mouth,  broad  forehead,  and  clear- 
cut,  somewhat  hard-featured  face,  he  was  a  man 
Avho,  if  he  had  no  brilliant  talent,  was  yet  so  dog- 
ged, so  patient,  and  so  strong  that  he  might  in  the 


LOT  NO.  249.  213 

end  overtop  a  more  showy  genius.  A  man  who 
can  hold  his  own  among  Scotchmen  and  North 
Germans  is  not  a  man  to  be  easily  set  back. 
Smith  had  left  a  name  at  Glasgow^  and  at  Berlin, 
and  he  was  bent  now  upon  doing  as  much  at 
Oxford,  if  hard  work  and  devotion  could  accom- 
plish it. 

He  had  sat  reading  for  about  an  hour,  and  the 
hands  of  the  noisy  carriage  clock  upon  the  side 
table  were  rapidly  closing  together  uj)on  the 
twelve,  w^hen  a  sudden  sound  fell  upon  the  stu- 
dent's ear — a  sharj^,  rather  shrill  sound,  like  the 
hissing  intake  of  a  man's  breath  who  gasps  under 
some  strong  emotion.  Smith  laid  down  his  book 
and  slanted  his  ear  to  listen.  There  was  no  one 
on  either  side  or  above  him,  so  that  the  interruj)- 
tion  came  certainly  from  the  neighbour  beneath — 
the  same  neighbour  of  whom  Hastie  had  given  so 
unsavoury  an  account.  Smith  knew  him  only  as 
a  flabby,  pale-faced  man  of  silent  and  studious 
habits,  a  man,  whose  lam^D  threw  a  golden  bar 
from  the  old  turret  even  after  he  had  extin- 
guished his  own.  This  community  in  lateness 
had  formed  a  certain  silent  bond  between  them. 
It  was  soothing  to  Smith  w^hen  the  hours  stole 
on  towards  dawning  to  feel  that  there  was  another 
so  close  who  set  as  small  a  value  upon  his  sleep 
as  he  did.  Even  now,  as  his  thoughts  turned  to- 
wards him.  Smith's  feelings  were  kindly.     Hastie 


214  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

was  a  good  fellow,  but  lie  was  rough,  strong- 
fibred,  with  no  imagination  or  sympathy.  He 
could  not  tolerate  departures  from  what  he 
looked  upon  as  the  model  type  of  manliness. 
If  a  man  could  not  be  measured  by  a  public- 
school  standard,  then  he  was  beyond  the  pale 
with  Hastie.  Like  so  many  who  are  themselves 
robust,  he  was  apt  to  confuse  the  constitution 
with  the  character,  to  ascribe  to  want  of  principle 
what  was  really  a  want  of  circulation.  Smith, 
with  his  stronger  mind,  knew  his  friend's  habit, 
and  made  allowance  for  it  now  as  his  thoughts 
turned  towards  the  man  beneath  him. 

There  was  no  return  of  the  singular  sound,  and 
Smith  was  about  to  turn  to  his  work  once  more, 
when  suddenly  there  broke  out  in  the  silence  of 
the  night  a  hoarse  cry,  a  positive  scream  — the  call 
of  a  man  who  is  moved  and  shaken  beyond  all 
control.  Smith  sprang  out  of  his  chair  and 
dropped  his  book.  He  was  a  man  of  fairly  firm 
fibre,  but  there  was  something  in  this  sudden,  un- 
controllable shriek  of  horror  which  chilled  his 
blood  and  pringled  in  his  skin.  Coming  in  such  a 
place  and  at  such  an  hour,  it  brought  a  thousand 
fantastic  possibilities  into  his  head.  Should  he 
rush  down,  or  was  it  better  to  wait?  He  had  all 
the  national  hatred  of  making  a  scene,  and  he 
knew  so  little  of  his  neighbour  that  he  would  not 
lightly  intrude  upon  his  affairs.     For  ^  moment 


LOT  NO.  249.  215 

he  stood  in  doubt  and  even  as  lie  balanced  the 
matter  there  was  a  quick  rattle  of  footsteps  ujjon 
the  stairs,  and  young  Monkhouse  Lee,  half 
dressed  and  as  white  as  ashes,  burst  into  his 
room. 

"Come  down!"  he  gasped.  " Bellingham's 
ill." 

Abercrombie  Smith  followed  him  closely  down 
stairs  into  the  sitting-room  which  was  beneath  his 
own,  and  intent  as  he  was  upon  the  matter  in 
hand,  he  could  not  but  take  an  amazed  glance 
around  him  as  he  crossed  the  threshold.  It  was 
such  a  chamber  as  he  had  never  seen  before — a 
museum  rather  than  a  study.  Walls  and  ceiling 
were  thickly  covered  with  a  thousand  strange 
relics  from  Egypt  and  the  East.  Tall,  angular 
figures  bearing  burdens  or  weapons  stalked  in  an 
uncouth  frieze  round  the  apartments.  Above 
were  bull-headed,  stork-headed,  cat-headed,  owl- 
headed  statues,  with  viper-crowned,  almond-eyed 
monarchs,  and  strange,  beetle-like  deities  cut  out 
of  the  blue  Egyptian  lapis  lazuli.  Horus  and  Isis 
and  Osiris  peeped  down  from  every  niche  and 
shelf,  while  across  the  ceiling  a  true  son  of  Old 
Nile,  a  great,  hanging- jawed  crocodile,  was  slung, 
in  a  double  noose. 

In  the  centre  of  this  singular  chamber  was  a 
large,  square  table,  littered  with  papers,  bottles, 
and  the  dried  leaves  of  some  graceful,  palm-like 


216  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

plant.  These  varied  objects  had  all  been  heaped 
together  in  order  to  make  room  for  a  mummy 
case,  which  had  been  conveyed  from  the  wall,  as 
was  evident  from  the  gap  there,  and  laid  across 
the  front  of  the  table.  The  mummy  itself,  a 
horrid,  black,  withered  thing,  like  a  charred  head 
on  a  gnarled  bush,  was  lying  half  out  of  the  case, 
with  its  clawlike  hand  and  bony  forearm  resting 
upon  the  table.  Propped  up  against  the  sarcoph- 
agus was  an  old  yellow  scroll  of  papyrus,  and 
in  front  of  it,  in  a  wooden  arm-chair,  sat  the 
owner  of  the  room,  his  head  thrown  back,  his 
widely-opened  eyes  directed  in  a  horrified  stare  to 
the  crocodile  above  him,  and  his  blue,  thick  lips 
puffing  loudly  with  every  expiration. 

"  My  God  !  he's  dying !  "  cried  Monkhouse  Lee 
distractedly. 

He  was  a  slim,  handsome  young  fellow,  olive- 
skinned  and  dark-eyed,  of  a  Spanish  rather  than 
of  an  English  type,  with  a  Celtic  intensity  of  man- 
ner which  contrasted  with  the  Saxon  phlegm  of 
Abercombie  Smith. 

"Only  a  faint,  I  think,"  said  the  medical 
student.  "  Just  give  me  a  hand  with  him.  You 
.take  his  feet.  Now  on  to  the  sofa.  Can  you  kick 
all  those  little  wooden  devils  off  ?  What  a  litter 
it  is !  Now  he  will  be  all  right  if  we  undo  his 
collar  and  give  him  some  water.  What  has  he 
been  up  to  at  all  ?  " 


LOT  NO.  249.  217 

"  I  don't  know.  I  heard  liim  cry  out.  I  ran 
up.  I  know  him  pretty  well,  you  know.  It  is 
very  good  of  you  to  come  down." 

"His  heart  is  going  like  a  pair  of  castanets," 
said  Smith,  laying  his  hand  on  the  breast  of  the 
unconscious  man.  "  He  seems  to  me  to  be  fright- 
ened all  to  pieces.  Chuck  the  water  over  him ! 
What  a  face  he  has  got  on  him  !  " 

It  was  indeed  a  strange  and  most  repellent 
face,  for  colour  and  outline  were  equally  unnatu- 
ral. It  was  white,  not  with  the  ordinary  pallor 
of  fear  but  with  an  absolutely  bloodless  white, 
like  the  under  side  of  a  sole.  He  was  very  fat, 
but  gave  the  impression  of  having  at  some  time 
been  considerably  fatter,  for  his  skin  hung  loosely 
in  creases  and  folds,  and  was  shot  with  a  mesh- 
work  of  wrinkles.  Short,  stubbly  brown  hair 
bristled  up  from  his  scalp,  with  a  pair  of  thick, 
wrinkled  ears  protruding  on  either  side.  His 
light  grey  eyes  were  still  open,  the  pupils  dilated 
and  the  balls  projecting  in  a  fixed  and  horrid 
stare.  It  seemed  to  Smith  as  he  looked  down 
upon  him  that  he  had  never  seen  nature's  danger 
signals  flying  so  plainly  upon  a  man's  counte- 
nance, and  his  thoughts  turned  more  seriously  to 
the  warning  which  Hastie  had  given  him  an  hour 
before. 

"What  the  deuce  can  have  frightened  him 
so  ?  "  he  asked. 

15 


218  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

"It's  the  mummy." 

' '  The  mummy  ?    How,  then  ? " 

"I  don't  know.  It's  beastly  and  morbid.  I 
wish  he  would  drop  it.  It's  the  second  fright  he 
has  given  me.  It  was  the  same  last  winter.  I 
found  him  just  like  this,  with  that  horrid  thing  in 
front  of  him." 

"  What  does  he  want  with  the  mummy, 
then?" 

"  Oh,  he's  a  crank,  you  know.  It's  his  hobby. 
He  knows  more  about  these  things  than  any  man 
in  England.  But  I  wish  he  wouldn't !  Ah,  he's 
beginning  to  come  to." 

A  faint  tinge  of  colour  had  begun  to  steal  back 
into  Belliugham's  ghastly  cheeks,  and  his  eyelids 
shivered  like  a  sail  after  a  calm.  He  clasped  and 
unclasped  his  hands,  drew  a  long,  thin  breath 
between  his  teeth,  and  suddenly  jerking  up  his 
head,  threw  a  glance  of  recognition  around  him. 
As  his  eyes  fell  npon  the  mummy,  he  sprang  off 
the  sofa,  seized  the  roll  of  papyrus,  thrust  it  into 
a  drawer,  turned  the  key,  and  then  staggered  back 
on  to  the  sofa. 

"What's  np?"  he  asked.  "What  do  you 
chaps  want  ? " 

"  You've  been  shrieking  out  and  making  no  end 
of  a  fuss,"  said  Monkhouse  Lee.  "If  our  neigh- 
bour here  from  above  hadn't  come  down,  I'm  sure 
I  don't  know  what  I  should  have  done  with  you." 


LOT   NO,  249.  219 

"All,  it's  Abercrombie  Smith,"  said  Belling- 
ham,  glancing  up  at  him.  "How  very  good  of 
you  to  come  in !  What  a  fool  I  am !  Oh,  my 
God,  what  a  fool  I  am  !  " 

He  sunk  his  head  on  to  his  hands,  and  burst 
into  peal  after  peal  of  hysterical  laughter. 

"  Look  here  !  Drop  it !  "  cried  Smith,  shaking 
him  roughly  by  the  shoulder. 

"Your  nerves  are  all  in  a  jangle.  You  must 
droj)  these  little  midnight  games  with  mummies, 
or  you'll  be  going  off  your  chump.  You're  all  on 
wires  now." 

"I  wonder,"  said  Bellingham,  "whether  you 
would  be  as  cool  as  I  am  if  you  had  seen " 

"What  then?" 

"Oh,  nothing.  I  meant  that  I  wonder  if  you 
could  sit  up  at  night  with  a  mummy  without  try.- 
ing  your  nerves.  I  have  no  doubt  that  you  are 
quite  right.  I  dare  say  that  I  have  been  taking 
it  out  of  myself  too  much  lately.  But  I  am  all 
right  now.  Please  don't  go,  though.  Just  wait 
for  a  few  minutes  until  I  am  quite  myself." 

"The  room  is  very  close,"  remarked  Lee, 
throwing  open  the  window  and  letting  in  the  cool 
night  air. 

"It's  balsamic  resin,"  said  Bellingham.  He 
lifted  up  one  of  the  dried  palmate  leaves  from  the 
table  and  frizzled  it  over  the  chimney  of  the  lamp. 
It  broke  away  into  heavy  smoke  wreaths,  and  a 


220  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

pungent,  biting  odour  filled  the  chamber.  •  "It's 
the  sacred  plant — the  plant  of  the  priests,"  he  re- 
marked. "Do  you  know  anything  of  Eastern 
languages,  Smith  ?  " 

"  Nothing  at  all.     Not  a  word." 

The  answer  seemed  to  lift  a  weight  from  the 
Egyptologist's  mind. 

"By-the-way,"  he  continued,  "how  long  was 
it  from  the  time  that  you  ran  down,  until  I  came 
to  my  senses  ? " 

"  Not  long.     Some  four  or  five  minutes." 

"  I  thought  it  could  not  be  very  long,"  said  he, 
drawing  a  long  breath.  "But  w^hat  a  strange 
thing  unconsciousness  is  !  There  is  no  measure- 
ment to  it,  I  could  not  tell  from  my  own  sensa- 
tions if  it  were  seconds  or  weeks.  Now  that 
gentleman  on  the  table  was  packed  up  in  the  days 
of  the  eleventh  dynasty,  some  forty  centuries  ago, 
and  yet  if  he  could  find  his  tongue  he  would  tell 
us  that  this  lapse  of  time  has  been  but  a  closing 
of  the  eyes  and  a  reopening  of  them.  He  is  a 
singularly  fine  mummy.  Smith." 

Smith  stepped  over  to  the  table  and  looked 
down  with  a  professional  eye  at  the  black  and 
tw-isted  form  in  front  of  him.  The  features, 
though  horribly  discoloured,  were  perfect,  and 
two  little  nut-like  eyes  still  lurked  in  the  depths 
of  the  black,  hollow  sockets.  The  blotched  skin 
was  drawn  tightly  from  bone  to  bone,  and  a  tan- 


LOT  NO.  249.  221 

gled  wrap  of  black  coarse  hair  fell  over  the  ears. 
Two  thin  teeth,  like  those  of  a  rat,  overlay  the 
shrivelled  lower  lip.  In  its  crouching  position, 
with  bent  joints  and  craned  head,  there  was  a  sug- 
gestion of  energy  about  the  horrid  thing  which 
made  Smith's  gorge  rise.  The  gaunt  ribs,  with 
their  parchment-like  covering,  were  exposed,  and 
the  sunken,  leaden-hued  abdomen,  with  the  long 
slit  where  the  embalmer  had  left  his  mark ;  but 
the  lower  limbs  were  wrapt  round  with  coarse 
yellow  bandages.  A  number  of  little  clove-like 
pieces  of  myrrh  and  of  cassia  were  sprinkled  over 
the  body,  and  lay  scattered  on  the  inside  of  the 
case. 

"I  don't  know  his  name,"  said  Bellingham, 
passing  his  hand  over  the  shrivelled  head.  "  You 
see  the  outer  sarcophagus  with  the  inscriptions  is 
missing.  Lot  249  is  all  the  title  he  has  now.  You 
see  it  printed  on  his  case.  That  was  his  number 
in  the  auction  at  which  I  picked  him  up." 

"He  has  been  a  very  pretty  sort  of  fellow  in 
his  day,"  remarked  Abercrombie  Smith. 

"  He  has  been  a  giant.  His  mummy  is  six  feet 
seven  in  length,  and  that  would  be  a  giant  over 
there,  for  they  were  never  a  very  robust  race. 
Feel  these  great  knotted  bones,  too.  He  would 
be  a  nasty  fellow  to  tackle." 

"  Perhaps  these  very  hands  helped  to  build 
the  stones  into  the  pyramids,"  suggested  Monk- 


222  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

house  Lee,  looking  down  with  disgust  in  his  eyes 
at  the  crooked,  unclean  talons. 

"No  fear.  This  fellow  has  been  pickled  in 
natron,  and  looked  after  in  the  most  approved 
style.  They  did  not  serve  hodsmen  in  that 
fashion.  Salt  or  bitumen  was  enough  for  them. 
It  has  been  calculated  that  this  sort  of  thing  cost 
about  seven  hundred  and  thirty  pounds  in  our 
money.  Our  friend  was  a  noble  at  the  least. 
What  do  you  make  of  that  small  inscription  near 
his  feet,  Smith  ? " 

"  I  told  you  that  I  know  no  Eastern  tongue." 

"Ah,  so  you  did.  It  is  the  name  of  the  em- 
balmer,  I  take  it.  A  very  conscientious  worker 
he  must  have  been.  I  wonder  how  many  modern 
works  will  survive  four  thousand  years  ? " 

He  kept  on  speaking  lightly  and  rapidly,  but 
it  was  evident  to  Abercrombie  Smith  that  he  was 
still  palpitating  with  fear.  His  hands  shook,  his 
lower  lip  trembled,  and  look  where  he  would, 
his  eye  always  came  sliding  round  to  his  grue- 
some companion.  Through  all  his  fear,  however, 
there  was  a  suspicion  of  triumph  in  his  tone 
and  manner.  His  eye  shone,  and  his  footstep, 
as  he  paced  the  room,  was  brisk  and  jaunty.  He 
gave  the  impression  of  a  man  who  has  gone 
through  an  ordeal,  the  marks  of  which  he  still 
bears  upon  him,  but  which  has  helped  him  to 
his  end. 


LOT   NO.  249.  223 

"  You're  not  going  yet  ? "  he  cried,  as  Smith 
rose  from  the  sofa. 

At  the  prospect  of  solitude,  his  fears  seemed  to 
crowd  back  upon  him,  and  he  stretched  out  a 
hand  to  detain  him. 

"Yes,  I  must  go.  I  have  my  work  to  do. 
You  are  all  right  now.  I  think  that  with  your 
nervous  system  you  should  take  up  some  less 
morbid  study." 

"  Oh,  I  am  not  nervous  as  a  rule ;  and  I  have 
unwrapijed  mummies  before." 

"You  fainted  last  time,"  observed  Monkhouse 
Lee. 

"  Ah,  yes,  so  I  did.  Well,  I  must  have  a  nerve 
tonic  or  a  course  of  electricity.  You  are  not  go- 
ing, Lee  ? " 

"  I'll  do  whatever  you  wish,  Ned." 

"Then  I'll  come  down  with  you  and  have  a 
shake-down  on  your  sofa.  Good-night,  Smith.  I 
am  so  sorry  to  have  disturbed  you  with  my  fool- 
ishness." 

They  shook  hands,  and  as  the  medical  student 
stumbled  up  the  spiral  and  iiTegular  stair  he 
heard  a  key  turn  in  a  door,  and  the  steps  of  his 
two  new  acquaintances  as  they  descended  to  the 
lower  floor. 

In  this  strange  way  began  the  acquaintance 
between   Edward    Bellingham   and  Abercrombie 


224  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

Smith,  an  acquaintance  which  the  latter,  at  least, 
had  no  desire  to  push  further.  Bellinghani,  how- 
ever, appeared  to  have  taken  a  fancy  to  his  rough- 
spoken  neighbour,  and  made  his  advances  in  such 
a  way  that  he  could  hardly  be  repulsed  without 
absolute  brutality.  Twice  he  called  to  thank 
Smith  for  his  assistance,  and  many  times  after- 
wards he  looked  in  with  books,  papers,  and  such 
other  civilities  as  two  bachelor  neighbours  can 
offer  each  other.  He  was,  as  Smith  soon  found,  a 
man  of  wide  reading,  with  catholic  tastes  and  an 
extraordinary  memory.  His  manner,  too,  was  so 
pleasing  and  suave  that  one  came,  after  a  time,  to 
overlook  his  repellent  appearance.  For  a  jaded 
and  wearied  man  he  was  no  unpleasant  com- 
panion, and  Smith  found  himself,  after  a  time, 
looking  forward  to  his  visits,  and  even  returning 
them. 

Clever  as  he  undoubtedly  was,  however,  the 
medical  student  seemed  to  detect  a  dash  of  in- 
sanity in  the  man.  He  broke  out  at  times  into  a 
high,  inflated  style  of  talk  which  was  in  contrast 
with  the  simplicity  of  his  life. 

*'It  is  a  wonderful  thing,"  he  cried,  "to  feel 
that  one  can  command  powers  of  good  and  of  evil 
— a  ministering  angel  or  a  demon  of  vengeance." 
And  again,  of  Monkhouse  Lee,  he  said, — "Lee  is 
a  good  fellow,  an  honest  fellow,  but  he  is  without 
strength  or  ambition.     He  would  not  make  a  fit 


LOT   NO.  249.  225 

partner  for  a  man  with  a  great  enterprise.  He 
would  not  make  a  fit  partner  for  me." 

At  such  hints  and  innuendoes  stolid  Smith, 
puffing  solemnly  at  his  pipe,  would  simply  raise 
his  eyebrows  and  shake  his  head,  with  little  inter- 
jections of  medical  wisdom  as  to  earlier  hours  and 
fresher  air. 

One  habit  Bellingham  had  developed  of  late 
which  Smith  knew  to  be  a  frequent  herald  of  a 
weakening  mind.  He  appeared  to  be  forever 
talking  to  himself.  At  late  hours  of  the  night, 
when  there  could  be  no  visitor  with  him.  Smith 
could  still  hear  his  voice  beneath  him  in  a  low, 
muffled  monologue,  sunk  almost  to  a  whisper,  and 
yet  very  audible  in  the  silence.  This  solitary 
babbling  annoyed  and  distracted  the  student,  so 
that  he  spoke  more  than  once  to  his  neighbour 
about  it.  Bellingham,  however,  flushed  up  at  the 
charge,  and  denied  curtly  that  he  had  uttered 
a  sound ;  indeed,  he  showed  more  annoyance 
over  the  matter  than  the  occasion  seemed  to  de- 
mand. 

Had  Abercrombie  Smith  had  any  doubt  as  to 
his  own  ears  he  had  not  to  go  far  to  find  cor- 
roboration. Tom  Styles,  the  little  wrinkled  man- 
servant who  had  attended  to  the  wants  of  the 
lodgers  in  the  turret  for  a  longer  time  than  any 
man's  memory  could  carry  him,  was  sorely  put  to 
it  over  the  same  matter. 


226  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

"If  you  please,  sir,"  said  he,  as  he  tidied 
down  the  top  chamber  one  morning,  "do  you 
think  Mr.  Bellingham  is  all  right,  sir  ?  " 

"AU  right,  Styles?" 

"Yes  sir.     Right  in  his  head,  sir." 

"  Why  should  he  not  be,  then?  " 

"Well,  I  don't  know,  sir.  His  habits  has 
changed  of  late.  He's  not  the  same  man  he  used 
to  be,  though  I  make  free  to  say  that  he  was 
never  quite  one  of  my  gentlemen,  like  Mr.  Hastie 
or  yourself,  sir.  He's  took  to  talkin'  to  himself 
something  awful.  I  wonder  it  don't  disturb  you. 
I  don't  know  what  to  make  of  him,  sir." 

"I  don't  know  what  business  it  is  of  yours, 
Styles." 

"Well,  I  takes  an  interest,  Mr.  Smith.  It 
may  be  forward  of  me,  but  I  can't  help  it.  I  feel 
sometimes  as  if  I  was  mother  and  father  to  my 
young  gentlemen.  It  all  falls  on  me  when  things 
go  wrong  and  the  relations  come.  But  Mr.  Bell- 
ingham, sir.  I  want  to  know  what  it  is  that 
walks  about  his  room  sometimes  when  he's  out 
and  when  the  door's  locked  on  the  outside." 

"Eh?  you're  talking  nonsense,  Styles." 

"Maybe  so,  sir;  but  I  heard  it  more'n  once 
with  my  own  ears." 

"Rubbish,  Styles." 

"Very  good,  sir.  You'U  ring  the  bell  if  you 
want  me." 


LOT  NO.  249.  227 

Abercrombie  Smith  gave  little  heed  to  the 
gossip  of  the  old  man-servant,  but  a  small  inci- 
dent occurred  a  few  days  later  which  left  an  un- 
pleasant effect  upon  his  mind,  and  brought  the 
words  of  Styles  forcibly  to  his  memory, 

Bellingham  had  come  up  to  see  him  late  one 
night,  and  was  entertaining  him  with  an  interest- 
ing account  of  the  rock  tombs  of  Beni  Hassan  in 
Upper  Egypt,  when  Smith,  whose  hearing  was 
remarkably  acute,  distinctly  heard  the  sound  of 
a  door  opening  on  the  landing  below, 

"  There's  some  fellow  gone  in  or  out  of  your 
room,"  he  remarked, 

Bellingham  sprang  up  and  stood  helpless  for  a 
moment,  with  the  expression  of  a  man  who  is  half 
incredulous  and  half  afraid. 

"  I  surely  locked  it,  I  am  almost  positive  that 
I  locked  it,"  he  stammered.  "No  one  could 
have  opened  it." 

"Why,  I  hear  someone  coming  up  the  steps 
now,"  said  Smith, 

Bellingham  rushed  out  through  the  door, 
slammed  it  loudly  behind  him,  and  hurried  down 
the  stairs.  About  half-way  down  Smith  heard  him 
stop,  and  thought  he  caught  the  sound  of  whisper- 
ing. A  moment  later  the  door  beneath  him  shut, 
a  key  creaked  in  a  lock,  and  Bellingham,  with 
beads  of  moisture  upon  his  pale  face,  ascended 
the  stairs  once  more,  and  re-entered  the  room. 


228  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

"It's  all  right,"  he  said,  throwing  himself 
down  in  a  chair.  "  It  was  that  fool  of  a  dog.  He 
had  pushed  the  door  open.  I  don't  know  how  I 
came  to  forget  to  lock  it." 

"  I  didn't  know  you  kept  a  dog,"  said  Smith, 
looking  very  thoughtfully  at  the  disturbed  face  of 
his  companion. 

"  Yes,  I  haven't  had  him  long.  I  must  get  rid 
of  him.     He's  a  great  nuisance." 

"He  must  be,  if  you  find  it  so  hard  to  shut 
him  up.  I  should  have  thought  that  shutting 
the  door  would  have  been  enought,  without  lock- 
ing it." 

"  I  want  to  prevent  old  Styles  from  letting 
him  out.  He's  of  some  value,  you  know,  and  it 
would  be  awkward  to  lose  him." 

"I  am  a  bit  of  a  dog-fancier  myself,"  said 
Smith,  still  gazing  hard  at  his  companion  from 
the  corner  of  his  eyes.  "Perhaps  you'll  let  me 
have  a  look  at  it." 

"Certainly.  But  I  am  afraid  it  cannot  be  to- 
night ;  I  have  an  appointment.  Is  that  clock 
right  ?  Then  I  am  a  quarter  of  an  hour  late  al- 
ready.    You'll  excuse  me,  I  am  sure." 

He  picked  up  his  cap  and  hurried  from  the 
room.  In  spite  of  his  appointment,  Smith  heard 
him  re-enter  his  own  chamber  and  lock  his  door 
upon  the  inside. 

This  interview  left  a  disagreeable  impression 


LOT  NO.  2t9.  229 

upon  the  medical  student's  mind.  Bellingham 
had  lied  to  him,  and  lied  so  clumsily  that  it 
looked  as  if  he  had  desperate  reasons  for  con- 
cealing the  truth.  Smith  knew  that  his  neigh- 
bour had  no  dog.  He  knew,  also,  that  the  step 
which  he  had  heard  upon  the  stairs  was  not  the 
step  of  an  animal.  But  if  it  were  not,  then  what 
could  it  be?  There  was  old  Styles' s  statement 
about  the  something  which  used  to  pace  the  room 
at  times  when  the  owner  was  absent.  Could  it  be 
a  woman  ?  Smith  rather  inclined  to  the  view.  If 
so,  it  would  mean  disgrace  and  expulsion  to  Bell- 
ingham if  it  were  discovered  by  the  authorities, 
so  that  his  anxiety  and  falsehoods  might  be  ac- 
counted for.  And  yet  it  was  inconceivable  that 
an  undergraduate  could  keep  a  woman  in  his 
rooms  without  being  instantly  detected.  Be  the 
explanation  what  it  might,  there  was  something 
ugly  about  it,  and  Smith  determined,  as  he  turned 
to  his  books,  to  discourage  all  further  attempts  at 
intimacy  on  the  part  of  his  soft-spoken  and  ill- 
favoured  neighbour. 

But  his  work  was  destined  to  interruption  that 
night.  He  had  hardly  caught  up  the  broken 
threads  when  a  firm,  heavy  footfall  came  three 
steps  at  a  time  from  below,  and  Hastie,  in  blazer 
and  flannels,  burst  into  the  room. 

"  Still  at  it !  "  said  he,  plumping  down  into 
his  wonted  arm-chair.     "What  a  chap  you  are  to 


230  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

stew !  I  believe  an  earthquake  might  come'  and 
knock  Oxford  into  a  cocked  hat,  and  you  would 
sit  perfectly  placid  with  your  books  among  the 
ruins.  However,  I  won't  bore  you  long.  Three 
whiffs  of  baccy,  and  I  am  off." 

"  What's  the  news,  then  ? "  asked  Smith,  cram- 
ming a  plug  of  bird's-eye  into  his  briar  with  his 
forefinger. 

"Nothing  very  much.  Wilson  made  70  for 
the  freshmen  against  the  eleven.  They  say  that 
they  will  play  him  instead  of  Buddicomb,  for 
Buddicomb  is  clean  off  colour.  He  used  to  be  able 
to  bowl  a  little,  but  it's  nothing  but  half-vollies 
and  long  hops  now." 

"Medium  right,"  suggested  Smith,  with  the 
intense  gravity  which  comes  upon  a  'varsity  man 
when  he  speaks  of  athletics. 

"  Inclining  to  fast,  with  a  work  from  leg. 
Comes  with  the  arm  about  three  inches  or  so.  He 
used  to  be  nasty  on  a  wet  wicket,  Oh,  by-the- 
way,  have  you  heard  about  Long  Norton  ?  " 

"What's  that?" 

"  He's  been  attacked." 

"Attacked?" 

"Yes,  just  as  he  was  turning  out  of  the  High 
Street,  and  Avithin  a  hundred  yards  of  the  gate  of 
Old's." 

"But  who ^" 

"Ah,    that's  the  rub!      If  you    said   'what,' 


LOT  NO.  249.  231 

you  would  be  more  grammatical.  Norton  swears 
that  it  was  not  human,  and,  indeed,  from  the 
scratches  on  his  throat,  I  should  be  inclined  to 
agree  with  him." 

"What,  then?  Have  we  come  down  to 
spooks  ? " 

Abercrombie  Smith  puffed  his  scientific  con- 
tempt. 

"Well,  no;  I  don't  think  that  is  quite  the 
idea,  either.  I  am  inclined  to  think  that  if  any 
showman  has  lost  a  great  ape  lately,  and  the 
brute  is  in  these  parts,  a  jury  would  find  a  true 
bill  against  it.  Norton  passes  that  way  every 
night,  you  know,  about  the  same  hour.  There's 
a  tree  that  hangs  low  over  the  path — the  big  elm 
from  Rainy's  garden.  Norton  thinks  the  thing 
dropped  on  him  out  of  the  tree.  Anyhow,  he  was 
nearly  strangled  by  two  arms,  which,  he  says, 
were  as  strong  and  as  thin  as  steel  bands.  He 
saw  nothing  ;  only  those  beastly  arms  that  tight- 
ened and  tightened  on  him.  He  yelled  his  head 
nearly  off,  and  a  couple  of  chaps  came  running, 
and  the  thing  went  over  the  wall  like  a  cat.  He 
never  got  a  fair  sight  of  it  the  whole  time.  It 
gave  Norton  a  shake  up,  I  can  tell  you.  I  tell 
him  it  has  been  as  good  as  a  change  at  the  sea-side 
for  him." 

"A  garrotter,  most  likely,"  said  Smith. 

"Yery  possibly.     Norton   says  not;    but  we 


232  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

don't  mind  what  lie  says.  The  garrotter  had  long 
nails,  and  was  pretty  smart  at  swinging  himself 
over  walls.  By- the- way,  your  beautiful  neigh- 
bour would  be  pleased  if  he  heard  about  it.  He 
had  a  grudge  against  Norton,  and  he's  not  a  man, 
from  what  I  know  of  him,  to  forget  his  little 
debts.  But  hallo,  old  chap,  what  have  you  got  in 
your  noddle  ? " 

"Nothing,"  Smith  answered  curtly. 

He  had  started  in  his  chair,  and  the  look  had 
flashed  over  his  face  which  comes  upon  a  man 
who  is  struck  suddenly  by  some  unpleasant  idea. 

"You  looked  as  if  something  I  had  said  had 
taken  you  on  the  raw.  By-the-way,  you  have 
made  the  acquaintance  of  Master  B.  since  I 
looked  in  last,  have  you  not  ?  Young  Monkhouse 
Lee  told  me  something  to  that  effect." 

"Yes  ;  I  know  him  slightly.  He  has  been  up 
here  once  or  twice." 

"Well,  you're  big  enough  and  ugly  enough 
to  take  care  of  yourself.  He's  not  what  I  should 
call  exactly  a  healthy  sort  of  Johnny,  though,  no 
doubt,  he's  very  clever,  and  all  that.  But  you'll 
soon  find  out  for  yourself.  Lee  is  all  right ;  he's 
a  very  decent  little  fellow.  Well,  so  long,  old 
chap !  I  row  Mullins  for  the  Vice-Chancellor's 
pot  on  Wednesday  week,  so  mind  you  come 
down,  in  case  I  don't  see  you  before." 

Bovine  Smith  laid  down  his  pipe  and  turned. 


LOT  NO.  249.  233 

stolidly  to  liis  books  ouce  more.  But  with  all 
the  will  in  the  world,  he  found  it  very  hard  to 
keep  his  mind  upon  his  work.  It  would  slip 
away  to  brood  upon  the  man  beneath  him,  and 
upon  the  little  mystery  which  hung  round  his 
chambers.  Then  his  thoughts  turned  to  this  sin- 
gular attack  of  which  Hastie  had  spoken,  and  to 
the  grudge  which  Bellingham  was  said  to  owe  the 
object  of  it.  The  two  ideas  would  persist  in  ris- 
ing together  in  his  mind,  as  though  there  were 
some  close  and  intimate  connection  between  them. 
And  yet  the  suspicion  was  so  dim  and  vague  that 
it  could  not  be  put  down  in  words. 

"Confound  the  chap!"  cried  Smith,  as  he 
shied  his  book  on  pathology  across  the  room. 
"He  has  spoiled  my  night's  reading,  and  that's 
reason  enough,  if  there  were  no  other,  why  I 
should  steer  clear  of  him  in  the  future." 

For  ten  days  the  medical  student  confined  him- 
self so  closely  to  his  studies  that  he  neither  saw 
nor  heard  anything  of  either  of  the  men  beneath 
him.  At  the  hours  w^hen  Bellingham  had  been 
accustomed  to  visit  him,  he  took  care  to  sport  his 
oak,  and  though  he  more  than  once  heard  a 
knocking  at  his  outer  door,  he  resolutely  refused 
to  answer  it.  One  afternoon,  however,  he  was 
descending  the  stairs  when,  just  as  he  was  passing 
it,  Bellingham's  door  flew  open,  and  young  Monk- 
house  Lee  came  out  with  his  eyes  sparkling  and 

16 


234         ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

a  dark  flush  of  anger  upon  his  olive  cheeks. 
Close  at  his  heels  followed  Bellingham,  his  fat, 
unhealthy  face  all  quivering  with  malignant  pas- 
sion. 

"You  fool!"  he  hissed.     "You'll  be  sorrj'-." 

"  Very  likely, "  cried  the  other.  "Mind  what 
I  say.     It's  off  !  I  won't  hear  of  it !  " 

"  You've  promised,  anyhow." 

"Oh,  I'll  keep  that !  I  won't  speak.  But  I'd 
rather  little  Eva  was  in  her  grave.  Once  for  all, 
it's  off.  She'll  do  what  I  say.  We  don't  want  to 
see  you  again." 

So  much  Smith  could  not  avoid  hearing,  but  he 
hurried  on,  for  he  had  no  wish  to  be  involved  in 
their  dispute.  There  had  been  a  serious  breach 
between  them,  that  was  clear  enough,  and  Lee 
was  going  to  cause  the  engagement  with  his  sister 
to  be  broken  off.  Smith  thought  of  Hastie's  com- 
parison of  the  toad  and  the  dove,  and  was  glad  to 
think  that  the  matter  was  at  ^n  end.  Belling- 
ham's  face  when  he  was  in  a  passion  was  not  pleas- 
ant to  look  upon.  He  was  not  a  man  to  whom  an 
innocent  girl  could  be  trusted  for  life.  As  he 
walked,  Smith  wondered  languidly  what  could 
have  caused  the  quarrel,  and  what  the  promise 
might  be  which  Bellingham  had  been  so  anxious 
that  Monkhouse  Lee  should  keep. 

It  v/as  the  day  of  the  sculling  match  between 
Hastie  and  MuUins,  and  a  stream  of  men  were 


M 


LOT  NO.  249.  235 

making  their  way  down  to  the  banks  of  the  Isis. 
A  May  sun  was  shining  brightly,  and  the  yellow 
path  was  barred  with  the  black  shadows  of  the 
tall  elm-trees.  On  either  side  the  grey  colleges 
lay  back  from  the  road,  the  hoary  old  mothers  of 
minds  looking  out  from  theu-  high,  mullioned 
windows  at  the  tide  of  young  life  which  swept  so 
merrily  past  them.  Black-clad  tutors,  prim  offi- 
cials, pale  reading  men,  brown-faced,  straw-hatted 
young  athletes  in  white  sweaters  or  many-coloured 
blazers,  all  were  hurrying  towards  the  blue  wind- 
ing river  which  curves  through  the  Oxford  mead- 
ows. 

Abercrombie  Smith,  with  the  intuition  of  an 
old  oarsman,  chose  his  position  at  the  point  where 
he  knew  that  the  struggle,  if  there  were  a  strug- 
gle, would  come.  Far  off  he  heard  the  hum 
which  announced  the  start,  the  gathering  roar  of 
the  approach,  the  thunder  of  running  feet,  and 
the  shouts  of  the  men  in  the  boats  beneath  him. 
A  spray  of  half-clad,  deep-breathing  runners  shot 
past  him,  and  craning  over  their  shoulders,  he 
saw  Hastie  pulling  a  steady  thirty-six,  while  his 
opponent,  with  a  jerky  forty,  was  a  good  boat's 
length  behind  him.  Smith  gave  a  cheer  for  his 
friend,  and  pulling  out  his  watch,  was  starting  off 
again  for  his  chambers,  when  he  felt  a  touch  upon 
his  shoulder,  and  found  that  young  Monkhouse 
Lee  was  beside  him. 


236  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

"I  saw  you  there,"  he  said,  in  a  timid,  depre- 
cating way.  "I  wanted  to  speak  to  3^011,  if  you 
could  spare  me  a  lialf-hour.  This  cottage  is  mine. 
I  share  it  with  Harrington  of  King's.  Come  in 
and  have  a  cup  of  tea." 

"I  must  be  back  presently,"  said  Smith.  "I 
am  hard  on  the  grind  at  present.  But  I'll  come  in 
for  a  few  minutes  mth  pleasure.  I  wouldn't  have 
come  out  only  Hastie  is  a  friend  of  mine." 

"So  he  is  of  mine.  Hasn't  he  a  beautiful 
style  ?  Mullins  wasn't  in  it.  But  come  into  the 
cottage.  It's  a  little  den  of  a  place,  but  it  is 
pleasant  to  work  in  during  the  summer  months." 

It  was  a  small,  square,  white  building,  with 
green  doors  and  shutters,  and  a  rustic  trellis-work 
porch,  standing  back  some  fifty  yards  from  the 
river's  bank.  Inside,  the  main  room  was  rough- 
ly fitted  up  as  a  study — deal  table,  unpainted 
shelves  with  books,  and  a  few  cheap  oleographs 
upon  the  wall.  A  kettle  sang  upon  a  spirit-stove, 
and  there  were  tea  things  upon  a  tray  on  the 
table. 

"Try  that  chair  and  have  a  cigarette,"  said 
Lee.  "Let  me  pour  you  out  a  cup  of  tea.  It's 
so  good  of  you  to  come  in,  for  I  know  that  your 
time  is  a  good  deal  taken  up.  I  wanted  to  say  to 
you  that,  if  I  w^ere  you,  I  should  change  my  rooms 
at  once." 

"Eh?" 


LOT   NO.  249.  237 

Smith  sat  staring  with  a  lighted  match  in  one 
hand  and  his  unlit  cigarette  in  the  other. 

"Yes;  it  must  seem  very  extraordinary,  and 
the  worst  of  it  is  that  I  cannot  give  my  reasons, 
for  I  am  under  a  solemn  promise— a  very  solemn 
promise.  But  I  may  go  so  far  as  to  say  that  I 
don't  think  Bellingham  is  a  very  safe  man  to  live 
near.  I  intend  to  camp  out  here  as  much  as  I  can 
for  a  time." 

"  Not  safe  !     What  do  you  mean  ? " 

"Ah,  that's  what  I  mustn't  say.  But  do  take 
my  advice,  and  move  your  rooms.  We  had  a 
grand  row  to-day.  You  must  have  heard  us,  for 
you  came  down  the  stairs." 

"  I  saw  that  you  had  fallen  out." 

"  He's  a  hon'ible  chap.  Smith,  That  is  the  only 
word  for  him.  1  have  had  doubts  about  him  ever 
since  that  night  when  he  fainted— you  remember, 
when  you  came  down.  I  taxed  him  to-day,  and 
he  told  me  things  that  made  my  hair  rise,  and 
wanted  me  to  stand  in  with  him.  I'm  not  strait- 
laced,  but  I  am  a  clergj^man's  son,  you  know,  and 
I  think  there  are  some  things  which  are  quite  be- 
yond the  pale.  I  only  thank  God  that  I  found 
him  out  before  it  was  too  late,  for  he  was  to  have 
married  into  my  family." 

"This  is  all  very  fine,  Lee,"  said  Abercrombie 
Smith  curtly.  "  But  either  you  are  saying  a  great 
deal  too  much  or  a  great  deal  too  little." 


238  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

"  I  give  you  a  warning." 

"  If  there  is  real  reason  for  warning,  no  promise 
can  bind  you.  If  I  see  a  rascal  about  to  blow  a 
place  up  with  dynamite  no  pledge  will  stand  in 
my  way  of  preventing  him." 

"Ah,  but  I  cannot  prevent  him,  and  I  can  do 
nothing  but  warn  you." 

"  Without  saying  what  you  warn  me  against." 

"Against  Bellingham." 

"But  that  is  childish.  Why  should  I  fear 
him,  or  any  man  ?  " 

"I  can't  tell  you.  I  can  only  entreat  you  to 
change  your  rooms.  You  are  in  danger  where 
you  are.  I  don't  even  say  that  Bellingham  would 
wish  to  injure  you.  But  it  might  happen,  for  he 
is  a  dangerous  neighbour  just  now. " 

"  Perhaps  I  know  more  than  you  think,"  said 
Smith,  looking  keenly  at  the  young  man's  boyish, 
earnest  face.  "  Suppose  I  tell  you  that  some  one 
else  shares  Bellingham's  rooms." 

Monkhouse  Lee  sprang  from  his  chair  in  un- 
controllable excitement. 

"  You  know,  then  ?  "  he  gasped. 

"  A  woman." 

Lee  dropped  back  again  with  a  groan. 

"My  lips  are  sealed,"  he  said.     "I  must  not 


"  Well,  anyhow,"  said  Smith,  rising,  "it  is  not 
likely  that  I  should  allow  myself  to  be  frightened 


LOT  NO.  249.  239 

out  of  rooms  which  suit  me  very  nicely.  It  would 
be  a  little  too  feeble  for  me  to  move  out  all  my 
goods  and  chattels  because  you  say  that  Belling- 
ham  might  in  some  unexplained  way  do  me  an 
injury.  I  think  that  I'll  just  take  my  chance, 
and  stay  where  I  am,  and  as  I  see  that  it's  nearly 
five  o'clock,  I  must  ask  you  to  excuse  me. " 

He  bade  the  young  student  adieu  in  a  few  curt 
words,  and  made  his  way  homeward  through  the 
sweet  spring  evening,  feeling  half- ruffled,  half- 
amused,  as  any  other  strong,  unimaginative  man 
might  who  has  been  menaced  by  a  vague  and 
shadowy  danger. 

There  was  one  little  indulgence  which  Aber- 
crombie  Smith  always  allowed  himself,  however 
closely  his  work  might  press  upon  him.  Twice  a 
week,  on  the  Tuesday  and  the  Friday,  it  was  his 
invariable  custom  to  walk  over  to  Farlingford,  the 
residence  of  Dr.  Plumptree  Peterson,  situated 
about  a  mile  and  a  half  out  of  Oxford.  Peter- 
son had  been  a  close  friend  of  Smith's  elder 
brother  Francis,  and  as  he  was  a  bachelor,  fairly 
well-to-do,  with  a  good  cellar  and  a  better  library, 
his  house  was  a  pleasant  goal  for  a  man  who  was 
in  need  of  a  brisk  walk.  Twice  a  week,  then,  the 
medical  student  would  swing  out  there  along  the 
dark  country  roads,  and  spend  a  pleasant  hour 
in  Peterson's  comfortable  study,  discussing,  over 
a  glass  of  old  port,  the  gossip  of  the  'varsity 


240  ROUND  THE  RED   LAMP. 

or  the  latest  developments  of  medicine  or  of 
surgery. 

On  the  day  which  followed  his  interview  with 
Monkhouse  Lee,  Smith  shut  up  his  books  at  a 
quarter  past  eight,  the  hour  when  he  usually 
started  for  his  friend's  house.  As  he  was  leaving 
his  room,  however,  his  eyes  chanced  to  fall  upon 
one  of  the  books  which  Bellingham  had  lent  him, 
and  his  conscience  pricked  him  for  not  having 
returned  it.  However  repellent  the  man  might 
be,  he  should  not  be  treated  with  discourtesy. 
Taking  the  book,  he  walked  downstairs  and 
knocked  at  his  neighbour's  door.  There  was 
no  answer ;  but  on  turning  the  handle  he  found 
that  it  was  unlocked.  Pleased  at  the  thought 
of  avoiding  an  interview,  he  stepped  inside, 
and  placed  the  book  with  his  card  upon  the 
table. 

The  lamp  was  turned  half  down,  but  Smith 
could  see  the  details  of  the  room  plainly  enough. 
It  was  all  much  as  he  had  seen  it  before — the 
frieze,  the  animal-headed  gods,  the  hanging 
crocodile,  and  the  table  littered  over  with  papers 
and  dried  leaves.  The  mummy  case  stood  up- 
right against  the  wall,  but  the  mummy  itself  was 
missing.  There  was  no  sign  of  any  second  occu- 
pant of  the  room,  and  he  felt  as  he  withdrew  that 
he  had  probably  done  Bellingham  an  injustice. 
Had  he  a  guilty  secret  to  preserve,    he   would 


LOT   NO.  249.  241 

hardly  leave  his  door  open  so  that  all  the  world 
might  enter. 

The  spiral  stair  was  as  black  as  pitch,  and 
Smith  was  slowly  making  his  way  down  its 
irregular  steps,  when  he  was  suddenly  conscious 
that  something  had  passed  him  in  the  darkness. 
There  was  a  faint  sound,  a  whiff  of  air,  a  light 
brushing  past  his  elbow,  but  so  slight  that  he 
could  scarcely  be  certain  of  it.  He  stopped  and 
listened,  but  the  wind  was  rustling  among  the  ivy 
outside,  and  he  could  hear  nothing  else. 

"  Is  that  you.  Styles  ?  "  he  shouted. 

There  was  no  answer,  and  all  was  still  behind 
him.  It  must  have  been  a  sudden  gust  of  air, 
fi)r  there  were  crannies  and  cracks  in  the  old  tur- 
ret. And  yet  he  could  almost  have  sworn  that  he 
heard  a  footfall  by  his  very  side.  He  had  emerged 
into  the  quadrangle,  still  turning  the  matter  over 
in  his  head,  when  a  man  came  running  swiftly 
across  the  smooth  cropped  lawn. 

"Is  that  you.  Smith?" 

"Hullo,  Hastie!" 

"  For  God's  sake  come  at  once  !  Young  Lee  is 
drowned !  Here's  Harrington  of  King's  with  the 
news.  The  doctor  is  out.  You'll  do,  but  come 
along  at  once.     There  may  be  life  in  him." 

"  Have  you  brandy  ? " 

"No." 

"  I'll  bring  some.     There's  a  flask  on  my  table." 


242  KDLAD    TUl^    KhJU    IjA.MF. 

Smith  bounded  up  the  stairs,  taking  three  at  a 
time,  seized  the  fiask,  and  was  rushing  down  with 
it,  when,  as  he  passed  Bellingham's  room,  his  eyes 
fell  upon  something  which  left  him  gasping  and 
staring  upon  the  landing. 

The  door,  which  he  had  closed  behind  him, 
was  now  open,  and  right  in  front  of  him,  with 
the  lamp-light  shining  upon  it,  was  the  mummy 
case.  Three  minutes  ago  it  had  been  empty. 
He  could  swear  to  that.  Now  it  framed  the  lank 
body  of  its  horrible  occupant,  who  stood,  grim  and 
stark,  with  his  black  shrivelled  face  towards  the 
door.  The  form  was  lifeless  and  inert,  but  it 
seemed  to  Smith  as  he  gazed  that  there  still  lin- 
gered a  lurid  spark  of  vitality,  some  faint  sign  of 
consciousness  in  the  little  eyes  which  lurked  in 
the  depths  of  the  hollow  sockets.  So  astounded 
and  shaken  was  he  that  he  had  forgotten  his 
errand,  and  was  still  staring  at  the  lean,  sunken 
figure  when  the  voice  of  his  friend  below  recalled 
him  to  himself. 

"Come  on,  Smith!"  he  shouted.  "It's  life 
and  death,  you  know.  Hurry  up  !  Now,  then," 
he  added,  as  the  medical  student  reappeared,  "let 
us  do  a  sprint.  It  is  well  under  a  mile,  and  we 
should  do  it  in  five  minutes.  A  human  life  is 
better  worth  running  for  than  a  pot." 

Neck  and  neck  they  dashed  through  the  dark- 
ness,  and  did  not  pull  up  until,   panting    and 


LOT  NO.  249.  243 

spent,  they  had  reached  the  little  cottage  by  the 
river.  Young  Lee,  limp  and  dripping  like  a 
broken  water-plant,  was  stretched  upon  the  sofa, 
the  green  scum  of  the  river  upon  his  black  hair, 
and  a  fringe  of  white  foam  upon  his  leaden-hued 
lips.  Beside  him  knelt  his  fellow-student  Har- 
rington, endeavouring  to  chafe  some  warmth  back 
into  his  rigid  limbs. 

"  I  think  there's  life  in  him,"  said  Smith,  with 
his  hand  to  the  lad's  side.  "Put  your  watch 
glass  to  his  lips.  Yes,  there's  dimming  on  it. 
You  take  one  arm,  Hastie.  Now  work  it  as  1  do, 
and  we'll  soon  pull  him  round." 

For  ten  minutes  they  worked  in  silence,  inflat- 
ing and  depressing  the  chest  of  the  unconscious 
man.  At  the  end  of  that  time  a  shiver  ran 
through  his  body,  his  lips  trembled,  and  he 
opened  his  eyes.  The  three  students  burst  out 
into  an  irrepressible  cheer. 

"Wake  up,  old  chap.  You've  frightened  us 
quite  enough." 

"Have  some  brandy.  Take  a  sip  from  the 
flask." 

"  He's  all  right  now,"  said  his  companion  Har- 
rington. "  Heavens,  what  a  fright  I  got !  I  was 
reading  here,  and  he  had  gone  for  a  stroll  as 
far  as  the  river,  when  I  heard  a  scream  and  a 
splash.  Out  I  ran,  and  by  the  time  that  I  could 
find  him  and  fish  him  out,  all  life  seemed  to  have 


244  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

gone.  Then  Simpson  couldn't  get  a  doctor,  for  lie 
has  a  game-leg,  and  I  had  to  run,  and  I  don't 
know  what  I'd  have  done  without  you  fellows. 
That's  right,  old  chap.     Sit  up." 

Monkhouse  Lee  had  raised  himself  on  his 
hands,  and  looked  wildly  about  him. 

"What's  up?"  he  asked.  "I've  been  in  the 
water.     Ah,  yes  ;  I  remember." 

A  look  of  fear  came  into  his  eyes,  and  he  sank 
his  face  into  his  hands. 

"How  did  you  fall  in?" 

"I  didn't  fall  in." 

"How,  then?" 

"I  was  thrown  in.  I  was  standing  by  the 
bank,  and  something  from  behind  picked  me  u^d 
like  a  feather  and  hurled  me  in.  I  heard  nothing, 
and  I  saw  nothing.  But  I  know  what  it  was,  for 
all  that." 

"  And  so  do  I,"  whispered  Smith. 

Lee  looked  up  with  a  quick  glance  of  surprise. 

"You've  learned,  then?"  he  said.  "You  re- 
member the  advice  I  gave  you  ?  " 

"Yes,  and  I  begin  to  think  that  I  shall  take 
it." 

"  I  don't  know  what  the  deuce  you  fellows  are 
talking  about,"  said  Hastie,  "but  I  think,  if  I 
were  you,  Harrington,  I  should  get  Lee  to  bed  at 
once.  It  will  be  time  enough  to  discuss  the  why 
and  the  wherefore  when  he  is  a  little  stronger.     I 


LOT   NO.  249.  245 

think,  Smith,  you  and  I  can  leave  him  alone  now. 
I  am  walking  back  to  college  ;  if  you  are  coming 
in  that  direction,  we  can  have  a  chat." 

But  it  was  little  chat  that  they  had  upon  their 
homeward  path.  Smith's  mind  was  too  full  of  the 
incidents  of  the  evening,  the  absence  of  the  mum- 
my from  his  neighbour's  rooms,  the  step  that 
passed  him  on  the  stair,  the  reappearance— the 
extraordinary,  inexplicable  reappearance  of  the 
grisly  thing — and  then  this  attack  upon  Lee,  cor- 
responding so  closely  to  the  previous  outrage  upon 
another  man  against  whom  Bellingham  bore  a 
grudge.  All  this  settled  in  his  thoughts,  together 
with  the  many  little  incidents  which  had  pre- 
viously turned  him  against  his  neighbour,  and  the 
singular  circumstances  under  which  he  was  first 
called  in  to  him.  What  had  been  a  dim  suspi- 
cion, a  vague,  fantastic  conjecture,  had  suddenly 
taken  form,  and  stood  out  in  his  mind  as  a  grim 
fact,  a  thing  not  to  be  denied.  And  yet,  how 
monstrous  it  w^as  !  how  unheard  of !  how  entirely 
beyond  all  bounds  of  human  experience.  An  im- 
partial judge,  or  even  the  friend  wiio  walked  by 
his  side,  would  simply  tell  him  that  his  eyes  had 
deceived  him,  that  the  mummy  had  been  there  all 
the  time,  that  young  Lee  had  tumbled  into  the 
river  as  any  other  man  tumbles  into  a  rivei',  and 
that  a  blue  pill  was  the  best  thing  for  a  disordered 
liver.     He  felt  that  he  would  have  said  as  much  if 


246  ROUND   THE   RED   LAMP. 

tlie  positions  had  been  reversed.  And  yet  he 
could  swear  that  Bellingham  was  a  murderer  at 
heart,  and  that  he  wielded  a  weapon  such  as  no 
man  had  ever  used  in  all  the  grim  history  of 
crime. 

Hastie  had  branched  off  to  his  rooms  with  a 
few  crisp  and  emphatic  comments  upon  his  friend's 
unsociability,  and  Abercrombie  Smith  crossed  the 
quadrangle  to  his  corner  turret  with  a  strong  feel- 
ing of  repulsion  for  his  chambers  and  their  asso- 
ciations. He  would  take  Lee's  advice,  and  move 
his  quarters  as  soon  as  possible,  for  how  could  a 
man  study  when  his  ear  was  ever  straining  for 
every  murmur  or  footstep  in  the  room  below  ?  He 
observed,  as  he  crossed  over  the  lawn,  that  the 
light  was  still  shining  in  Bellingham's  window, 
and  as  he  passed  ujd  the  staii'case  the  door  opened, 
and  the  man  himself  looked  out  at  him.  With 
his  fat,  evil  face  he  was  like  some  bloated  spider 
fresh  from  the  weaving  of  his  poisonous  web. 

"  Good-evening,"  said  he.  "  Won't  you  come 
in?" 

"No,"  cried  Smith,  fiercely. 

"No?  You  are  busy  as  ever?  I  wanted  to 
ask  you  about  Lee.  I  was  sorry  to  hear  that 
there  was  a  rumour  that  something  was  amiss  with 
him." 

His  features  were  grave,  but  there  was  the 
gleam  of  a  hidden  laugh  in  his  eyes  as  he  spoke. 


LOT   NO.  249.  247 

Smith  saw  it,  and  he  could  have  knocked  him 
down  for  it. 

"  You'll  be  sorrier  still  to  hear  that  Monkhouse 
Lee  is  doing  very  well,  and  is  out  of  all  danger," 
he  answered.  "Your  hellish  tricks  have  not 
come  off  this  time.  Oh,  you  needn't  try  to  brazen 
it  out.     I  know  all  about  it." 

Bellingham  took  a  step  back  from  the  angry 
student,  and  half-closed  the  door  as  if  to  protect 
himself. 

"You  are  mad,"  he  said.  "What  do  you 
mean  ?  Do  you  assert  that  I  had  anything  to  do 
with  Lee's  accident  ? " 

"  Yes,"  thundered  Smith.  "  You  and  that  bag 
of  bones  behind  you  ;  you  worked  it  between  you. 
I  tell  you  what  it  is.  Master  B.,  they  have  given 
up  burning  folk  like  you,  but  we  still  keep  a 
hangman,  and,  by  George  !  if  any  man  in  this  col- 
lege meets  his  death  while  you  are  here,  I'll  have 
you  up,  and  if  you  don't  swing  for  it,  it  won't  be 
my  fault.  You'll  find  that  your  filthy  Egyptian 
tricks  won't  answer  in  England." 

"You're  a  raving  lunatic,"  said  Bellingham. 

"All  right.  You  just  remember  what  I 
say,  for  you'll  find  that  I'll  be  better  than  my 
word." 

The  door  slammed,  and  Smith  went  fuming  up 
to  his  chamber,  where  he  locked  the  door  upon 
the  inside,  and  spent  half  the  night  in  smoking 


248  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

his  old  briar  and  brooding  over  the  strange  events 
of  the  evening. 

Next  morning  x\bercrombie  Smith  heard  noth- 
ing of  his  neighbour,  but  Harrington  called  upon 
him  in  the  afternoon  to  say  that  Lee  was 
almost  himself  again.  All  day  Smith  stuck  fast 
to  his  work,  but  in  the  evening  he  determined  to 
pay  the  visit  to  his  friend  Dr.  Peterson  upon 
which  he  had  started  upon  the  night  before.  A 
good  walk  and  a  friendly  chat  would  be  welcome 
to  his  jangled  nerves. 

Bellingham's  door  was  shut  as  he  passed,  but 
glancing  back  when  he  was  some  distance  from 
the  turret,  he  saw  his  neighbour's  head  at  the 
window  outlined  against  the  lamp-light,  his  face 
pressed  apparently  against  the  glass  as  he  gazed 
out  into  the  darkness.  It  was  a  blessing  to  be 
away  from  all  contact  with  him,  but  if  for  a  few 
hours,  and  Smith  stepped  out  briskly,  and  breathed 
the  soft  spring  air  into  his  lungs.  The  half -moon 
lay  in  the  west  between  two  Gothic  pinnacles,  and 
threw  upon  the  silvered  street  a  dark  tracery  from 
the  stone-work  above.  There  was  a  brisk  breeze, 
and  light,  fleecy  clouds  drifted  swiftly  across  the 
sky.  Old's  was  on  the  very  border  of  the  town, 
and  in  five  minutes  Smith  found  himself  beyond 
the  houses  and  between  the  hedges  of  a  May- 
scented  Oxfordshire  lane. 

It  was  a  lonely   and  little    frequented    road 


LOT  NO.  249.  249 

which  led  to  his  friend's  house.  Early  as  it  was, 
Smith  did  not  meet  a  single  soul  upon  his  way. 
He  walked  briskly  along  until  he  came  to  the 
avenue  gate,  which  opened  into  the  long  gravel 
drive  leading  up  to  Farlingford.  In  front  of  him 
he  could  see  the  cosy  red  light  of  the  windows 
glimmering  through  the  foliage.  He  stood  with 
his  hand  upon  the  iron  latch  of  the  swinging  gate, 
and  he  glanced  back  at  the  road  along  which  he 
had  come.    Something  was  coming  swiftly  down  it. 

It  moved  in  the  shadow  of  the  hedge,  silently 
and  fartively,  a  dark,  crouching  figure,  dimly 
visible  against  the  black  background.  Even  as  he 
gazed  back  at  it,  it  had  lessened  its  distance  by 
twenty  paces,  and  was  fast  closing  upon  him. 
Out  of  the  darkness  he  had  a  glimpse  of  a  scraggy 
neck,  and  of  two  eyes  that  will  ever  haunt  him  in 
his  dreams.  He  turned,  and  with  a  cry  of  terror 
he  ran  for  his  life  up  the  avenue.  There  were  the 
red  lights,  the  signals  of  safety,  almost  within  a 
stone's  throw  of  him.  He  was  a  famous  runner, 
but  never  had  he  run  as  he  ran  that  night. 

The  heavy  gate  had  swung  into  place  behind 
him,  but  he  heard  it  dash  open  again  before  his 
pursuer.  As  he  rushed  madly  and  wildly  through 
the  night,  he  could  hear  a  swift,  dry  patter  behind 
him,  and  could  see,  as  he  threw  back  a  glance, 
that  this  horror  was  bounding  like  a  tiger  at  his 
heels,  with  blazing  eyes  and  one  stringy  arm  out- 
17 


250  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

thrown.  Thank  God,  the  door  was  ajar.  He 
could  see  the  thin  bar  of  light  which  shot  from 
the  lamp  in  the  hall.  Nearer  yet  sounded  the 
clatter  from  behind.  He  heard  a  hoarse  gurgling 
at  his  very  shoulder.  With  a  shriek  he  flung 
himself  against  the  door,  slammed  and  bolted  it 
behind  him,  and  sank  half-fainting  on  to  the  hall 
chair. 

"My  goodness.  Smith,  what's  the  matter?" 
asked  Peterson,  appearing  at  the  door  of  his 
study. 

"  Give  me  some  brandy  !  " 

Peterson  disappeared,  and  came  rushing  out 
again  with  a  glass  and  a  decanter. 

"You  need  it,"  he  said,  as  his  visitor  drank  off 
what  he  poured  out  for  him.  "Why,  man,  you 
are  as  white  as  a  cheese." 

Smith  laid  down  his  glass,  rose  up,  and  took  a 
deep  breath. 

" I  am  my  own  man  again  now,"  said  he.  "I 
was  never  so  unmanned  before.  But,  with  your 
leave,  Peterson,  I  will  sleep  here  to-night,  for  I 
don't  think  I  could  face  that  road  again  except  by 
daylight.     It's  weak,  I  know,  but  I  can't  help  it." 

Peterson  looked  at  his  visitor  with  a  very 
questioning  eye. 

"Of  course  yoa  shall  sleep  here  if  you  wish. 
I'll  tell  Mrs.  Burney  to  make  up  the  spare  bed. 
Where  are  you  off  to  now  ? " 


LOT  NO.  249.  251 

"Come  up  witli  me  to  the  window  that  over- 
looks the  door.  I  want  you  to  see  what  I  have 
seen." 

They  went  up  to  the  window  of  the  iipi^er  hall 
whence  they  could  look  down  upon  the  approach 
to  the  house.  The  drive  and  the  fields  on  either 
side  lay  quiet  and  still,  bathed  in  the  peaceful 
moonlight. 

"Well,  really,  Smith,"  remarked  Peterson, 
"it  is  well  that  I  know  you  to  be  an  abstemious 
man.  What  in  the  world  can  have  frightened 
you  ? " 

"I'll  tell  you  presently.  But  where  can  it 
have  gone  I  Ah,  now  look,  look  !  See  the  curve 
of  the  road  just  beyond  your  gate." 

"Yes,  I  see  ;  you  needn't  pinch  my  arm  off. 
I  saw  someone  pass.  I  should  say  a  man,  rather 
thin,  apparently,  and  tall,  very  tall.  But  what  of 
him  ?  And  what  of  yourself  ?  You  are  still  shak- 
ing like  an  aspen  leaf." 

"I  have  been  within  hand-grip  of  the  devil, 
that's  all.  But  come  down  to  your  study,  and  I 
shall  tell  you  the  whole  story." 

He  did  so.  Under  the  cheery  lamplight,  with 
a  glass  of  wine  on  the  table  beside  him,  and 
the  portly  form  and  florid  face  of  his  friend  in 
front,  he  narrated,  in  their  order,  all  the  events, 
great  and  small,  which  had  formed  so  singular  a 
chain,  from  the  night  on  which  he  had  found 


252  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

Bellingham  fainting  in  front  of  the  mummy  case 
until  his  horrid  experience  of  an  hour  ago. 

"  There  now,"  he  said  as  he  concluded,  "  that's 
the  whole  black  business.  It  is  monstrous  and 
incredible,  but  it  is  true." 

Dr.  Plumptree  Peterson  sat  for  some  time  in 
silence  with  a  very  puzzled  expression  upon  his 
face. 

"  I  never  heard  of  such  a  thing  in  my  life, 
never  !  "  he  said  at  last.  "  You  have  told  me  the 
facts.     Now  tell  me  your  inferences." 

' '  You  can  draw  your  own. " 

"  But  I  should  like  to  hear  yours.  You  have 
thought  over  the  matter,  and  I  have  not." 

"  Well,  it  must  be  a  little  vague  in  detail,  but 
the  main  points  seem  to  me  to  be  clear  enough. 
This  fellow  Bellingham,  in  his  Eastern  studies, 
has  got  hold  of  some  infernal  secret  by  which  a 
mummy — or  possibly  only  this  particular  mummy 
— can  be  temporarily  brought  to  life.  He  was 
trying  this  disgusting  business  on  the  night  when 
he  fainted.  No  doubt  the  sight  of  the  creature 
moving  had  shaken  his  nerve,  even  though  he 
had  expected  it.  You  remember  that  almost  the 
first  words  he  said  were  to  call  out  upon  himself 
as  a  fool.  AVell,  he  got  more  hardened  after- 
wards, and  carried  the  matter  through  without 
fainting.  The  vitality  which  he  could  put  into  it 
was  evidently  only  a  passing  thing,  for  I  have 


LOT  NO.  2id.  253 

seen  it  continually  in  its  case  as  dead  as  this 
table.  He  has  some  elaborate  process,  I  fancy, 
by  which  he  brings  the  thing  to  pass.  Having 
done  it,  he  naturally  bethought  him  that  he  might 
use  the  creature  as  an  agent.  It  has  intelligence 
and  it  has  strength.  For  some  purpose  he  took 
Lee  into  his  confidence ;  but  Lee,  like  a  decent 
Christian,  would  have  nothing  to  do  with  such  a 
business.  Then  they  had  a  row,  and  Lee  vowed 
that  he  would  tell  his  sister  of  Bellingham's  true 
character.  Bellingham's  game  was  to  prevent 
him,  and  he  nearly  managed  it,  by  setting  this 
creature  of  his  on  his  track.  He  had  already  tried 
its  powers  upon  another  man — Norton — tow^ards 
whom  he  had  a  grudge.  It  is  the  merest  chance 
that  he  has  not  two  murders  upon  his  soul.  Then, 
w^hen  I  taxed  him  with  the  matter,  he  had  the 
strongest  reasons  for  wishing  to  get  me  out  of  the 
way  before  I  could  convey  my  knowledge  to  any- 
one else.  He  got  his  chance  when  I  went  out,  for 
he  knew  my  kabits,  and  where  I  was  bound  for. 
I  have  had  a  narrow  shave,  Peterson,  and  it  is 
mere  luck  you  didn't  find  me  on  your  doorstep  in 
the  morning.  I'm  not  a  nervous  man  as  a  rule, 
and  I  never  thought  to  have  the  fear  of  death  put 
upon  me  as  it  w^as  to-night." 

"  My  dear  boy,  you  take  the  matter  too  seri- 
ously," said  his  companion.  "Your  nerves  are 
out  of  order  with  your  work,  and  you  make  too 


254  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

mucli  of  it.  How  could  sucli  a  thing  as  this  stride 
about  the  streets  of  Oxford,  even  at  night,  without 
being  seen  ? " 

"It  has  been  seen.  There  is  quite  a  scare  in 
the  town  about  an  escaped  ape,  as  they  imagine 
the  creature  to  be.     It  is  the  talk  of  the  place." 

"  Well,  it's  a  striking  chain  of  events.  And 
yet,  my  dear  fellow,  you  must  allow  that  each 
incident  in  itself  is  capable  of  a  more  natural  ex- 
planation." 

"  What !  even  my  adventure  of  to-night  ?  " 
"  Certainly.  You  come  out  with  your  nerves 
all  unstrung,  and  your  head  full  of  this  theory  of 
yours.  Some  gaunt,  half-famished  trami3  steals 
after  you,  and  seeing  you^  run,  is  emboldened  to 
pursue  you.  Your  fears  and  imagination  do  the 
rest." 

"  It  won't  do,  Peterson  ;  it  won't  do." 

"And  again,  in  the  instance  of  your  finding 

the  mummy  case  empty,  and  then  a  few  moments 

later  with  an  occupant,  you  know  that  it  was 

lamplight,  that  the  lamp  was  half  turned  down, 

and  that  you  had  no  special  reason  to  look  hard 

at  the  case.     It  is  quite  possible  that  you  may 

have  overlooked  the  creature  in  the  first  instance." 

"  No,  no  ;  it  is  out  of  the  question." 

"  And  then  Lee  may  have  fallen  into  the  river, 

and   Norton   been   garrotted.     It  is   certainly  a 

formidable    indictment    that    you    have    against 


LOT  NO.  249.  255 

Bellingliam ;  but  if  you  were  to  place  it  before 
a  police  magistrate,  he  would  simply  laugli  in 
your  face." 

"  I  know  lie  would.  That  is  why  I  mean  to 
take  the  matter  into  my  own  hands." 

"Eh?" 

"  Yes  ;  I  feel  that  a  public  duty  rests  upon 
me,  and,  besides,  I  must  do  it  for  my  own  safety, 
unless  I  choose  to  allow  myself  to  be  hunted  by 
this  beast  out  of  the  college,  and  that  would  be  a 
little  too  feeble.  I  have  quite  made  up  my  mind 
what  I  shall  do.  And  first  of  all,  may  I  use  your 
paper  and  pens  for  an  hour  ?  " 

"Most  certainly.  You  will  find  all  that  you 
want  upon  that  side  table." 

Abercrombie  Smith  sat  down  before  a  sheet  of 
foolscap,  and  for  an  hour,  and  then  for  a  second 
hour  his  pen  travelled  swiftly  over  it.  Page  after 
page  was  finished  and  tossed  aside  while  his  friend 
leaned  back  in  his  arm-chair,  looking  across  at 
him  with  patient  curiosity.  At  last,  with  an  ex- 
clamation of  satisfaction.  Smith  sprang  to  his  feet, 
gathered  his  papers  up  into  order,  and  laid  the 
last  one  upon  Peterson's  desk. 

"Kindly  sign  this  as  a  witness,"  he  said. 

"A  witness?    Of  what?" 

"Of  my  signature,  and  of  the  date.  The  date 
is  the  most  important.  Why,  Peterson,  my  life 
might  hang  upon  it." 


256  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

"My  dear  Smith,  you  are  talking  wildly.  Let 
me  beg  you  to  go  to  bed." 

"  On  the  contrary,  I  never  spoke  so  deliberately 
in  my  life.  And  I  will  promise  to  go  to  bed  the 
moment  you  have  signed  it." 

"  But  what  is  it  ? " 

"It  is  a  statement  of  all  that  I  have  been  tell- 
ing you  to-night.     I  wish  you  to  witness  it." 

"Certainly,"  said  Peterson,  signing  his  name 
under  that  of  his  companion.  "There  you  are! 
But  what  is  the  idea?  " 

"You  will  kindly  retain  it,  and  produce  it  in 
case  I  am  arrested." 

"Arrested?    For  what?" 

"For  murder.  It  is  quite  on  the  cards.  I  wish 
to  be  ready  for  every  event.  There  is  only  one 
course  open  to  me,  and  I  am  determined  to 
take  it." 

"For  Heaven's  sake,  don't  do  anything  rash  !  " 

"Believe  me,  it  would  be  far  more  rash  to 
adopt  any  other  course.  I  hope  that  we  won't 
need  to  bother  you,  but  it  will  ease  my  mind 
to  know  that  you  have  this  statement  of  my 
motives.  And  now  I  am  ready  to  take  your  ad- 
vice and  to  go  to  roost,  for  I  want  to  be  at  my 
best  in  the  morning." 

Abercrombie  Smith  was  not  an  entirely  pleas- 
ant man  to  have  as  an  enemy.     Slow  and  easy- 


LOT  NO.  249.  257 

tempered,  he  was  formidable  when  driven  to  ac- 
tion. He  brought  to  every  purpose  in  life  the 
same  deliberate  resoluteness  which  had  distin- 
guished him  as  a  scientific  student.  He  had  laid 
his  studies  aside  for  a  day,  but  he  intended  that 
the  day  should  not  be  wasted.  Not  a  word  did  he 
say  to  his  host  as  to  his  plans,  but  by  nine  o'clock 
he  was  well  on  his  way  to  Oxford. 

In  the  High  Street  he  stopped  at  Clifford's,  the 
gun-maker's,  and  bought  a  heavy  revolver,  with 
a  box  of  central-fire  cartridges.  Six  of  them  he 
slipped  into  the  chambers,  and  half- cocking  the 
weapon,  placed  it  in  the  pocket  of  his  coat.  He 
then  made  his  way  to  Hastie's  rooms,  where  the 
big  oarsman  was  lounging  over  his  breakfast,  with 
the  Sporting  Times  propped  up  against  the  coffee- 
pot. 

"Hullo!  What's  up?"  he  asked.  "Have 
some  coffee?" 

"No,  thank  you.  I  want  you  to  come  with 
me,  Hastie,  and  do  what  I  ask  you." 

"  Certainly,  my  boy." 

"And  bring  a  heavy  stick  with  you." 

"Hullo!"  Hastie  stared.  "Here's  a  hunting- 
crop  that  would  fell  an  ox." 

"  One  other  thing.  You  have  a  box  of  ampu- 
tating knives.     Give  me  the  longest  of  them." 

"  There  you  are.  You  seem  to  be  fairly  on  the 
war  trail.    Anything  else  % " 


258  ROUND   THE   RED   LAMP. 

"No;  that  will  do."  Smith  placed  the  knife 
inside  his  coat,  and  led  the  way  to  the  quadrangle. 
"  We  are  neither  of  us  chickens,  Hastie,"  said  he. 
"I  think  I  can  do  this  job  alone,  but  I  take  you 
as  a  precaution.  I  am  going  to  have  a  little  talk 
with  Bellingham.  If  I  have  only  him  to  deal 
with,  I  won't,  of  course,  need  you.  If  I  shout, 
however,  up  you  come,  and  lam  out  with  your 
whip  as  hard  as  you  can  lick.  Do  you  under- 
stand \ " 

"All  right.     I'll  come  if  I  hear  you  bellow." 

"  Stay  here,  then.  It  may  be  a  little  time,  but 
don't  budge  until  I  come  down." 

"I'm  a  fixture." 

Smith  ascended  the  stairs,  opened  Belling- 
ham's  door  and  stepped  in.  Bellingham  was 
seated  behind  his  table,  writing.  Beside  him, 
among  his  litter  of  strange  possessions,  towered 
the  mummy  case,  with  its  sale  number  249  still 
stuck  upon  its  front,  and  its  hideous  occupant 
stiff  and  stark  within  it.  Smith  looked  very  de- 
liberately round  him,  closed  the  door,  locked  it, 
took  the  key  from  the  inside,  and  then  stepping 
across  to  the  fireplace,  struck  a  match  and  set  the 
fire  alight.  Bellingham  sat  staring,  with  amaze- 
ment and  rage  upon  his  bloated  face. 

"Well,  really  now,  you  make  yourself  at 
home,"  he  gasped. 

Smith  sat  himself  deliberately  down,  placing 


LOT  NO.  249.  259 

his  watch  upon  the  table,  drew  out  his  pistol, 
cocked  it,  and  laid  it  in  his  lap.  Then  he  took 
the  long  amputating  knife  from  his  bosom,  and 
threw  it  down  in  front  of  Bellingham. 

"Now,  then,"  said  he,  "just  get  to  work  and 
cut  up  that  mummy." 

"Oh,  is  that  it?"  said  Bellingham  with  a 
sneer. 

"  Yes,  that  is  it.  They  tell  me  that  the  law 
can't  touch  you.  But  I  have  a  law  that  will  set 
matters  straight.  If  in  five  minutes  you  have  not 
set  to  work,  I  swear  by  the  God  who  made  me 
that  I  will  put  a  bullet  through  your  brain  !  " 

"  You  would  murder  me  ? " 

Bellingham  had  half  risen,  and  his  face  was 
the  colour  of  putty. 

"Yes." 

"  And  for  what  ? " 

"  To  stop  your  mischief.  One  minute  has 
gone." 

"  But  what  have  I  done  ? " 

"  I  know  and  you  know." 

"This  is  mere  bullying." 

"  Two  minutes  are  gone." 

"  But  you  must  give  reasons.  You  are  a  mad- 
man— a  dangerous  madman.  Why  should  I  de- 
stroy my  own  property  ?  It  is  a  valuable  mum- 
my." 

"You  must  cut  it  up,  and  you  must  burn  it." 


260  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

"  I  will  do  no  sncli  thing/ 

"Four  minutes  are  gone." 

Smith  took  up  the  jjistol  and  he  looked  to- 
wards Bellingham  with  an  inexorable  face.  As 
the  second-hand  stole  round,  he  raised  Ms  hand, 
and  the  finger  twitched  upon  the  trigger. 

"There!  there!  I'll  do  it!"  screamed  Belling- 
ham. 

In  frantic  haste  lie  caught  up  the  knife  and 
hacked  at  the  figure  of  the  mummy,  ever  glancing 
round  to  see  the  eye  and  the  weapon  of  his  terri- 
ble visitor  bent  upon  him.  The  creature  crackled 
and  snapped  under  every  stab  of  the  keen  blade. 
A  thick  yellow  dust  rose  up  from  it.  Spices  and 
dried  essences  rained  down  upon  the  floor.  Sud- 
denly, with  a  rending  crack,  its  backbone  snapped 
asunder,  and  it  fell,  a  brown  heap  of  sprawling 
limbs,  upon  the  floor. 

"  Now  into  the  fire  ! "  said  Smith. 

The  flames  leaped  and  roared  as  the  dried  and 
tinderlike  debris  was  piled  upon  it.  The  little 
room  was  like  the  stoke  hole  of  a  steamer  and  the 
sweat  ran  down  the  faces  of  the  two  men  ;  but 
still  the  one  stooped  and  worked,  while  tke  other 
sat  watching  him  with  a  set  face.  A  thick,  fat 
smoke  oozed  out  from  the  fire,  and  a  heavy  smell 
of  burned  rosin  and  singed  hair  filled  the  air.  In 
a  quarter  of  an  hour  a  few  charred  and  brittle 
sticks  were  all  that  was  left  of  Lot  No.  249. 


LOT  NO.  249.  2C1 

"Perhaps  that  will  satisfy  you,"  snarled  Be]l- 
ingham,  with  hate  and  fear  in  his  little  grey  eyes 
as  he  glanced  back  at  his  tormenter. 

"No ;  I  must  make  a  clean  sweej)  of  all  your 
materials.  We  must  have  no  more  devil's  tricks. 
In  with  all  these  leaves !  They  may  have  some- 
thing to  do  with  it." 

"And  what  now?"  asked  Bellingham,  when 
the  leaves  also  had  been  added  to  the  blaze. 

"Now  the  roll  of  papyrus  which  you  had  on 
the  table  that  night.  It  is  in  that  drawer,  I 
think." 

"  No,  no,"  shouted  Bellingham.  "  Don't  burn 
that !  Why,  man,  you  don't  know  what  you  do. 
It  is  unique ;  it  contains  wisdom  which  is  no- 
where else  to  be  found." 

"Out  with  it!" 

"  But  look  here,  Smith,  you  can't  really  mean 
it.  I'll  share  the  knowledge  with  you.  I'll  teach 
you  all  that  is  in  it.  Or,  stay,  let  me  only  copy  it 
before  you  burn  it !  " 

Smith  stepped  forward  and  turned  the  key  in 
the  drawer.  Taking  out  the  yellow,  curled  roll 
of  paper,  he  threw  it  into  the  fire,  and  pressed  it 
down  with  his  heel.  Bellingham  screamed,  and 
grabbed  at  it ;  but  Smith  pushed  him  back,  and 
stood  over  it  until  it  was  reduced  to  a  formless 
grey  ash. 

"Now,  Master  B.,"  said  he,  "I  think  I  have 


262  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

pretty  well  drawn  your  teeth.  You'll  hear -from 
me  again,  if  you  return  to  your  old  tricks.  And 
now  good-morning,  for  I  must  go  back  to  my 
studies." 

And  such,  is  the  narrative  of  Abercrombie 
Smith  as  to  the  singular  events  which  occurred 
in  Old  College,  Oxford,  in  the  spring  of  '84.  As 
Bellingliam  left  the  university  immediately  after- 
wards, and  was  last  heard  of  in  the  Soudan,  there 
is  no  one  who  can  contradict  his  statement.  But 
the  wisdom  of  men  is  small,  and  the  ways  of 
nature  are  strange,  and  who  shall  put  a  bound  to 
the  dark  things  which  may  be  found  by  those 
wlio  seek  for  them  ? 


THE  LOS  AMIGOS  FIASCO. 

I  USED  to  be  the  leading  practitioner  of  Los 
Amigos.  Of  course,  everyone  lias  heard  of  the 
great  electrical  generating  gear  there.  The  town 
is  wide  spread,  and  there  are  dozens  of  little  town- 
lets  and  villages  all  round,  which  receive  their 
supply  from  the  same  centre,  so  that  the  works 
are  on  a  very  large  scale.  The  Los  Amigos  folk 
say  that  they  are  the  largest  upon  earth,  but  then 
we  claim  that  for  everything  in  Los  Amigos  ex- 
cept the  gaol  and  the  death-rate.  Those  are  said 
to  be  the  smallest. 

Now,  with  so  fine  an  electrical  supply,  it 
seemed  to  be  a  sinful  waste  of  hemp  that  the  Los 
Amigos  criminals  should  perish  in  the  old-fashioned 
manner.  And  then  came  the  news  of  the  electro- 
cutions in  the  East,  and  how  the  results  had  not 
after  all  been  so  instantaneous  as  had  been  hoped. 
The  Western  Engineers  raised  their  eyebrows 
when  they  read  of  the  puny  shocks  by  which 
these  men  had  perished,  and  they  vowed  in  Los 
Amigos  that  when  an  irreclaimable  came  their 

(803) 


264  ROUND  THE  RED   LAMP. 

way  lie  should  be  dealt  handsomely  by,  and  have 
the  rah  of  all  the  big  dynamos.  There  should  be 
no  reserve,  said  the  engineers,  but  he  should  have 
all  that  they  had  got.  And  what  the  result  of 
that  would  be  none  could  predict,  save  that  it 
must  be  absolutely  blasting  and  deadly.  Never 
before  had  a  man  been  so  charged  with  electricity 
as  they  would  charge  him.  He  was  to  be  smitten 
by  the  essence  of  ten  thunderbolts.  Some  proph- 
esied combustion,  and  some  disintegration  and 
disappearance.  They  were  waiting  eagerly  to 
settle  the  question  by  actual  demonstration,  and 
it  was  just  at  that  moment  that  Duncan  Warner* 
came  that  way. 

Warner  had  been  wanted  by  the  law,  and  by 
nobody  else,  for  many  years.  Desperado,  mur- 
derer, train  robber  and  road  agent,  he  was  a  man 
beyond  the  pale  of  human  pity.  He  had  deserved 
a  dozen  deaths,  and  the  Los  Amigos  folk  grudged 
him  so  gaudy  a  one  as  that.  He  seemed  to  feel 
himself  to  be  unworthy  of  it,  for  he  made  two 
frenzied  attempts  at  escape.  He  was  a  powerful, 
muscular  man,  with  a  lion  head,  tangled  black 
locks,  and  a  sweeping  beard  which  covered  his 
broad  chest.  When  he  was  tried,  there  was  no 
finer  head  in  all  the  crowded  court.  It's  no  new 
thing  to  find  the  best  face  looking  from  the  dock. 
But  his  good  looks  could  not  balance  his  bad 
deeds.      His  advocate  did  all  he  knew,  but  the 


THE  LOS   AMIGOS   FIASCO.  2G5 

cards  lay  against  him,  and  Duncan  Warner  was 
handed  over  to  the  mercy  of  the  big  Los  Amigos 
dynamos. 

I  was  there  at  the  committee  meeting  when  the 
matter  was  discussed.  The  town  council  had 
chosen  four  experts  to  look  after  the  arrange- 
ments. Three  of  them  were  admirable.  There 
was  Joseph  M 'Conner,  the  very  man  who  had 
designed  the  dynamos,  and  there  was  Joshua 
Westmacott,  the  chairman  of  the  Los  Amigos 
Electrical  Supply  Company,  Limited.  Then  there 
was  myself  as  the  chief  medical  man,  and  lastly 
an  old  German  of  the  name  of  Peter  Stulp- 
nagel.  The  Germans  were  a  strong  body  at  Los 
Amigos,  and  they  all  voted  for  their  man.  That 
was  how  he  got  on  the  committee.  It  was  said 
that  he  had  been  a  wonderful  electrician  at  home, 
and  he  was  eternally  working  with  wires  and  in- 
sulators and  Leyden  jars  ;  but,  as  he  never  seemed 
to  get  any  further,  or  to  have  any  results  worth 
publishing,  he  came  at  last  to  be  regarded  as  a 
harmless  crank,  who  had  made  science  his  hobby. 
We  three  practical  men  smiled  when  we  heard 
that  he  had  been  elected  as  our  colleague,  and  at 
the  meeting  we  fixed  it  all  up  very  nicely  among 
ourselves  without  much  thought  of  the  old  fellow 
who  sat  with  his  ears  scooped  forward  in  his 
hands,  for  he  was  a  trifle  hard  of  hearing,  taking 
no  more  part  in  the  proceedings  than  the  gentle- 

18 


260  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

men  of  the  press  who  scribbled  their  notes  on  the 
back  benches. 

We  did  not  take  long  to  settle  it  all.  In  New 
York  a  strength  of  some  two  thousand  volts  had 
been  used,  and  death  had  not  been  instantaneous. 
Evidently  their  shock  had  been  too  weak.  Los 
Amigos  should  not  fall  into  that  error.  The 
charge  should  be  six  times  greater,  and  therefore, 
of  course,  it  would  be  six  times  more  effective. 
Nothing  could  possibly  be  more  logical.  The 
whole  concentrated  force  of  the  great  dynamos 
should  be  employed  on  Duncan  Warner. 

So  we  three  settled  it,  and  had  already  risen  to 
break  up  the  meeting,  when  our  silent  companion 
opened  his  mouth  for  the  first  time. 

"Gentlemen,"  said  he,  "you  appear  to  me  to 
show  an  extraordinary  ignorance  upon  the  sub- 
ject of  electricity.  You  have  not  mastered  the 
first  principles  of  its  actions  upon  a  human  be- 
ing." 

The  committee  was  about  to  break  into  an  an^ 
gry  reply  to  this  brusque  comment,  but  the  chair- 
man of  the  Electrical  Company  tapped  his  fore- 
head to  claim  its  indulgence  for  the  crankiness  of 
the  speaker. 

"Pray  tell  us,  sir,"  said  he,  with  an  ironical 
smile,  "what  is  there  in  our  conclusions  with 
which  you  find  fault  \  " 

"With  your  assumption  that  a  large  dose  of 


I 


THE  LOS  AMIGOS  FIASCO.  207 

electricity  will  merely  increase  the  effect  of  a  small 
dose.  Do  you  not  think  it  possible  that  it  might 
have  an  entirely  different  result  ?  Do  you  know 
anything,  by  actual  experiment,  of  the  effect  of 
such  powerful  shocks  ? " 

"  We  knoAv  it  by  analogy,"  said  the  chairman, 
pompously.  ' '  All  drugs  increase  their  effect  when 
they  increase  their  dose  ;  for  example— for  exam- 
ple  " 

"  Whisk}^,"  said  Joseph  M 'Connor. 
•     "Quite  so.     Whisky.     You  see  it  there." 

Peter  Stulpnagel  smiled  and  shook  his  head. 

"Your  argument  is  not  very  good,"  said  he. 
"  When  I  used  to  take  whisky,  I  used  to  find  that 
one  glass  would  excite  me,  but  that  six  would 
send  me  to  sleep,  which  is  just  the  opposite.  Now, 
suppose  that  electricity  were  to  act  in  just  the  op- 
posite way  also,  what  then  I " 

We  three  practical  men  burst  out  laughing. 
We  had  known  that  our  colleague  was  queer,  but 
we  never  had  thought  that  he  would  be  as  queer 
as  this. 

"What  then?"  repeated  Philip  Stulpnagel. 

"  We'll  take  our  chances,"  said  the  chairman. 

"Pray  consider,"  said  Peter,  "that  workmen 
who  have  touched  the  wires,  and  who  have  re- 
ceived shocks  of  only  a  few  hundred  volts,  have 
died  instantly.  The  fact  is  well  known.  And  yet 
when  a  much  greater  force  was  used  upon  a  crim- 


2C8  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

inal  at  New  York,  tlie  man  struggled  for  some  lit- 
tle time.  Do  you  not  clearly  see  that  the  smaller 
dose  is  the  more  deadly  ?  " 

"I  think,  gentlemen,  that  this  discussion  has 
been  carried  on  quite  long  enough,"  said  the  chair- 
man, rising  again.  "The  point,  I  take  it,  has 
already  been  decided  by  the  majority  of  the  com- 
mittee, and  Duncan  AVarner  shall  be  electrocuted 
on  Tuesday  by  the  full  strength  of  the  Los  Amigos 
dynamos.     Is  it  not  so  ?  " 

"  I  agree,"  said  Joseph  M 'Connor. 

"I  agree,"  said  I. 

"And  I  protest,"  said  Peter  Stulpnagel. 

"  Then  the  motion  is  carried,  and  your  protest 
will.be  duly  entered  in  the  minutes,"  said  the 
chairman,  and  so  the  sitting  was  dissolved. 

The  attendance  at  the  electrocution  was  a  very 
small  one.  We  four  members  of  the  committee 
were,  of  course,  present  with  the  executioner,  who 
was  to  act  under  their  orders.  The  others  were 
the  United  States  Marshal,  the  governor  of  the 
gaol,  the  chaplain,  and  three  members  of  the  press. 
The  room  was  a  small  brick  chamber,  forming  an 
out-house  to  the  Central  Electrical  station.  It 
had  been  used  as  a  laundry,  and  had  an  oven  and 
copper  at  one  side,  but  no  other  furniture  save  a 
single  chair  for  the  condemned  man.  A  metal 
plate  for  his  feet  was  placed  in  front  of  it,  to 
which  ran  a  thick,  insulated  wire.    Above,  another 


THE   LOS  AMIGOS  FIASCO.  269 

wire  depended  from  the  ceiling,  wliicli  could  be 
connected  with  a  small  metallic  rod  projecting 
from  a  cap  which  was  to  be  placed  upon  his  head. 
When  this  connection  w^as  established  Duncan 
Warner's  hour  was  come. 

There  was  a  solemn  hush  as  we  waited  for  the 
coming  of  the  prisoner.  The  practical  engineers 
looked  a  little  pale,  and  fidgeted  nervously  with 
the  wires.  Even  the  hardened  Marshal  was  ill  at 
ease,  for  a  mere  hanging  was  one  thing,  and  this 
blasting  of  flesh  and  blood  a  very  different  one. 
As  to  the  pressmen,  their  faces  were  whiter  than 
the  sheets  which  lay  before  them.  The  only  man 
who  appeared  to  feel  none  of  the  influence  of  these 
preparations  was  the  little  German  crank,  who 
strolled  from  one  to  the  other  with  a  smile  on  his 
lips  and  mischief  in  his  eyes.  More  than  once  he 
even  went  so  far  as  to  burst  into  a  shout  of  laugh- 
ter, until  the  chaplain  sternly  rebuked  him  for  his 
ill-timed  levity. 

"How  can  you  so  far  forget  yourself,  Mr. 
Stulpnagel,"  said  he,  "as  to  Jest  in  the  presence 
of  death  ? " 

But  the  German  was  quite  unabashed. 

"If  I  were  in  the  presence  of  death  I  should 
not  jest,"  said  he,  "but  since  I  am  not  I  may  do 
what  I  choose." 

This  flippant  reply  was  about  to  draw  another 
and  a  sterner  reproof  from  the  chaplain,  when  the 


270  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

door  was  swung  open  and  two  warders  •  entered 
leading  Duncan  Warner  between  them.  He 
glanced  round  him  wdth  a  set  face,  stepped  reso- 
lutely forward,  and  seated  himself  upon  the  chair, 

"  Touch  her  off  !  "  said  he. 

It  was  barbarous  to  keep  him  in  suspense. 
The  chaplain  murmured  a  few  words  in  his  ear, 
the  attendant  placed  the  cap  upon  his  head,  and 
then,  while  we  all  held  our  breath,  the  wire  and 
the  metal  were  brought  in  contact. 

"Great  Scott !  "  shouted  Duncan  Warner, 

He  had  bounded  in  his  chair  as  the  frightful 
shock  crashed  through  his  system.  But  he  was 
not  dead.  On  the  contrary,  his  eyes  gleamed  far 
more  brightly  than  they  had  done  before.  There 
was  only  one  change,  but  it  was  a  singular  one. 
The  black  had  passed  from  his  hair  and  beard  as 
the  shadow  passes  from  a  landscape.  They  were 
both  as  white  as  snow.  And  yet  there  w\is  no 
other  sign  of  decay.  His  skin  w^as  smooth  and 
plump  and  lustrous  as  a  child's. 

The  Marshal  looked  at  the  committee  with  a 
reproachful  eye. 

"There  seems  to  be  some  hitch  here,  gentle- 
men," said  he. 

We  three  practical  men  looked  at  each  other. 

Peter  Stulpnagel  smiled  pensively, 

"I  think  that  another  one  should  do  It," 
said  I, 


THE  LOS  AMIGOS   FIASCO.  271 

Again  the  connection  was  made,  and  again 
Duncan  Warner  sprang  in  his  chair  and  shouted, 
but,  indeed,  were  it  not  that  he  still  remained  in 
the  chair  none  of  us  would  have  recognised  him. 
His  hair  and  his  beard  had  shredded  off  in  an  in- 
stant, and  the  room  looked  like  a  barber's  shop 
on  a  Saturday  night.  There  he  sat,  his  eyes  still 
shining,  his  skin  radiant  with  the  glow  of  perfect 
health,  but  with  a  scalp  as  bald  as  a  Dutch  cheese, 
and  a  chin  without  so  much  as  a  trace  of  down. 
He  began  to  revolve  one  of  his  arms,  slowly  and 
doubtfully  at  first,  but  with  more  confidence  as 
he  went  on. 

"That  jint,"  said  he,  "has  puzzled  half  the 
doctors  on  the  Pacific  Slope.  It's  as  good  as  new, 
and  as  limber  as  a  hickory  twig." 

"You  are  feeling  pretty  well  ?  "  asked  the  old 
German. 

"Never  better  in  my  life,"  said  Duncan  War- 
ner cheerily. 

The  situation  was  a  painful  one.  The  Mar- 
shal glared  at  the  committee.  Peter  Stulpnagel 
grinned  and  rubbed  his  hands.  The  engineers 
scratched  their  heads.  The  bald-headed  prisoner 
revolved  his  arm  and  looked  pleased. 

"  I  think  that  one  more  shock "  began  the 

chairman. 

"No,  sir,"  said  the  Marshal;  "we've  had 
foolery    enough    for    one    morning.      We    are 


272  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

here  for  an  execution,  and  a  execution  .  we'll 
have." 

"  What  do  you  propose  ? " 

"There's  a  hook  handy  upon  the  ceiling. 
Fetch  in  a  rope,  and  we'll  soon  set  this  matter 
straight. " 

There  was  another  awkward  delay  while  the 
warders  departed  for  the  cord.  Peter  Stulpnagel 
bent  over  Duncan  Warner,  and  whispered  some- 
thing in  his  ear.  The  desperado  started  in  sur- 
prise. 

"  You  don't  say  ?  "  he  asked. 

The  German  nodded. 

"What!     Noways?" 

Peter  shook  his  head,  and  the  two  began  to 
laugh  as  though  they  shared  some  huge  joke  be- 
tween them. 

The  rope  was  brought,  and  the  Marshal  him- 
self slipped  the  noose  over  the  criminal's  neck. 
Then  the  two  warders,  the  assistant  and  he  swung 
their  victim  into  the  air.  For  Half  an  hour  he 
hung — a  dreadful  sight — from  the  ceiling.  Then 
in  solemn  silence  they  lowered  him  down,  and  one 
of  the  warders  went  out  to  order  the  shell  to  be 
brought  round.  But  as  he  touched  ground  again 
what  was  our  amazement  when  Duncan  Warner 
put  his  hands  up  to  his  neck,  loosened  the  noose, 
and  took  a  long,  deep  breath. 

"Paul  Jefferson's  sale  is  goin'  well,"  he  re- 


THE  LOS  AMIGOS  FIASCO.  273 

marked,  "I  could  see  the  crowd  from  up  yonder/' 
and  he  nodded  at  the  hook  in  the  ceiling. 

"Up  with  him  again  !  "  shouted  the  Marshal, 
"  we'll  get  the  life  out  of  him  somehow." 

In  an  instant  the  victim  was  up  at  the  hook 
once  more. 

They  kept  him  there  for  an  hour,  but  when  he 
came  down  he  was  perfectly  garrulous. 

"Old  man  Plunket  goes  too  much  to  the  Ar- 
cady  Saloon,"  said  he.  "Three  times  he's  been 
there  in  an  hour ;  and  him  with  a  family.  Old 
man  Plunket  would  do  well  to  swear  off." 

It  was  monstrous  and  incredible,  but  there  it 
was.  There  was  no  getting  round  it.  The  man 
was  there  talking  when  he  ought  to  have  been 
dead.  We  all  sat  staring  in  amazement,  but 
United  States  Marshal  Carpenter  was  not  a  man 
to  be  euchred  so  easily.  He  motioned  the  others 
to  one  side,  so  that  the  prisoner  was  left  standing 
alone. 

"  Duncan  Warner,"  said  he,  slowly,  "  you  are 
here  to  play  your  part,  and  I  am  here  to  play 
mine.  Your  game  is  to  live  if  you  can,  and  my 
game  is  to  carry  out  the  sentence  of  the  law. 
You've  beat  us  on  electricity.  I'll  give  you  one 
there.  And  you've  beat  us  on  hanging,  for  you 
seem  to  thrive  on  it.  But  it's  my  turn  to  beat  you 
now,  for  my  duty  has  to  be  done." 

He  pulled  a  six-shooter  from  his  coat  as  he 


27i  ROUND  THE  EED  LAMP. 

spoke,  and  fired  all  the  shots  through  the  body  of 
the  prisoner.  The  room  was  so  filled  with  smoke 
that  we  could  see  nothing,  but  when  it  cleared  the 
prisoner  was  still  standing  there,  looking  down  in 
disgust  at  the  front  of  his  coat. 

"  Coats  must  be  cheap  where  you  come  from," 
said  he.  "Thirty  dollars  it  cost  me,  and  look  at 
it  now.  The  six  holes  in  front  are  bad  enough, 
but  four  of  the  balls  have  passed  out,  and  a  pretty 
state  the  back  must  be  in. " 

The  Marshal's  revolver  fell  from  his  hand,  and 
he  dropped  his  arms  to  his  sides,  a  beaten  man. 

"Maybe  some  of  you  gentlemen  can  tell  me 
what  this  means,"  said  he,  looking  helplessly  at 
the  committee. 

Peter  Stulpnagel  took  a  step  forward. 

"  I'll  tell  you  all  about  it,"  said  he. 

"You  seem  to  be  the  only  person  who  knows 
anything. " 

"I  am  the  only  person  who  knows  anything. 
I  should  have  warned  these  gentlemen ;  but,  as 
they  would  not  listen  to  me,  I  have  allowed  them 
to  learn  by  experience.  What  you  have  done 
with  your  electricity  is  that  you  have  increased 
this  man's  vitality  until  he  can  defy  death  for 
centuries." 

"Centuries  I  " 

"  Yes,  it  will  take  the  wear  of  hundreds  of 
years  to  exhaust  the  enormous  nervous  energy 


THE  LOS  AMIGOS  FIASCO.  275 

with  which  you  have  drenched  him.  Electricity 
is  life,  and  you  have  charged  him  with  it  to  the 
utmost.  Perhaps  in  fifty  years  you  might  execute 
him,  but  I  am  not  sanguine  about  it." 

"  Great  Scott !  What  shall  I  do  with  him  ? " 
cried  the  unhappy  Marshal. 

Peter  Stulpnagel  shrugged  his  shoulders. 

"It  seems  to  me  that  it  does  not  much  matter 
what  you  do  with  him  now,"  said  he. 

"Maybe  we  could  drain  the  electricity  out  of 
him  again.  Suppose  we  hang  him  up  by  the 
heels  I " 

"  No,  no,  it's  out  of  the  question." 

"Well,  well,  he  shall  do  no  more  mischief  in 
Los  Amigos,  anyhow,"  said  the  Marshal,  Avith  de- 
cision. "  He  shall  go  into  the  new  gaol.  The 
prison  will  wear  him  out. " 

"On  the  contrary,"  said  Peter  Stulpnagel,  "I 
think  that  it  is  much  more  probable  that  he  will 
wear  out  the  prison." 

It  was  rather  a  fiasco  and  for  years  we  didn't 
talk  more  about  it  than  we  could  help,  but  it's  no 
secret  now  and  I  thought  you  might  like  to  jot 
down  the  facts  in  your  case-book. 


THE  POCTOKS  OF   llOYLAND. 

Pk.  .Iamks  Kiri.KY  was  always  looked  upon 
as  an  exoeedingly  lucky  dog  by  all  of  the  pro- 
fession who  knew  him.  His  father  had  pi'eceded 
him  in  a  iiraotice  in  the  villaixe  of  Hoyland,  in  the 
north  of  Hampshire,  and  all  was  ready  for  liim 
on  the  very  first  day  that  the  law  allowed  him  to 
put  his  name  at  the  foot  of  a  prescription.  In  a 
few  years  the  old  gentleman  retiivd.  and  settled 
on  the  South  Coast,  leaving  his  son  in  undisputed 
possession  of  the  whole  eountry  side.  Save  for 
Dr.  Horton,  near  Basingstoke,  the  young  surgeon 
had  a  clear  run  of  six  miles  in  every  direction, 
and  took  his  tifteen  hundred  ponnds  a  year, 
though,  as  is  usual  in  country  practices,  the 
stable  swallowed  up  most  of  what  the  consulting- 
room  earned. 

Pr.  James  Kipley  was  two-and-thirty  years  of 
age,  reserved,  learned,  unmarried,  with  set,  rather 
stern  features,  and  a  thinning  of  the  dark  hair 
upon  the  top  of  his  head,  which  was  worth  quite 
a  hundred  a  year  to  him.     He  was  particularly 


THH   fiOOTOfLS  OK    ffOVf.A.VD.  $>77 

happy  in  his  mana^emf'nt  of  ladie^j.  'He  had 
canght  the  tone  of  bland  sternne«ifl  and  deciaive 
snavity  which  dominates  wirhorir,  offendinpf. 
I^adieiH,  however,  were  not  equally  happy  in  their 
rnanxigement  of  him.  Profesflionally,  he  waa  al- 
ways at  their  service.  S^x;ially,  he  was  a  drop  of 
quicksilver.  In  vain  the  country  mammas  spread 
out  their  simple  lures  in  front  of  him.  Dances 
and  picnics  were  not  to  his  taste,  and  he  jjreferred 
during  hi.s  scanty  leisure  to  shut  himself  up  in  his 
study,  and  to  bury  himself  in  Virchow's  Archivea 
and  the  professional  journals. 

Study  was  a  passion  with  him,  and  he  would 
have  none  of  the  rust  which  often  gathers  round 
a  country  practitioner.  It  was  his  ambition  to 
keep  his  knowledge  as  fresh  and  bright  as  at  the 
moment  when  he  had  stepped  out  of  the  exam- 
ination hall.  lie  prided  himself  on  being  able 
at  a  moment's  notice  to  rattle  off  the  seven  rami- 
fications of  some  obscure  artery,  or  to  give  the 
exact  percentage  of  any  physiological  compound- 
After  a  long  day's  work  he  would  sit  up  half  the 
night  performing  iridectomies  and  extractions 
ui>on  the  sheep's  eyes  sent  in  by  the  village 
butcher,  to  the  horror  of  his  housekeeper,  who 
had  to  remove  the  debris  next  morning.  His  love 
for  his  work  was  the  one  fanaticism  which  found 
a  place  in  his  dry,  preci.se  nature. 

It  was  the  more  to  his  credit  that  he  should 


278  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

keep  up  to  date  in  Ms  knowledge,  since  he  had 
no  competition  to  force  him  to  exertion.  In  the 
seven  years  during  which  he  had  practised  in 
Hoyland  three  rivals  had  pitted  themselves 
against  him,  two  in  the  village  itself  and  one  in 
the  neighbouring  hamlet  of  Lower  Hoyland.  Of 
these  one  had  sickened  and  wasted,  being,  as  it 
was  said,  himself  the  only  patient  whom  he  had 
treated  during  his  eighteen  months  of  ruralising. 
A  second  had  bought  a  fourth  share  of  a  Basing- 
stoke practice,  and  had  departed  honourably, 
while  a  third  had  vanished  on©  September  night, 
leaving  a  gutted  house  and  an  unpaid  drug  bill 
behind  him.  Since  then  the  district  had  become 
a  monopoly,  and  no  one  had  dared  to  measure 
himself  against  the  established  fame  of  the  Hoy- 
land doctor. 

It  was,  then,  with  a  feeling  of  some  surprise 
and  considerable  curiosity  that  on  driving  through 
Lower  Hoyland  one  morning  he  perceived  that 
the  new  house  at  the  end  of  the  village  was  occu- 
pied, and  that  a  virgin  brass  plate  glistened  upon 
the  swinging  gate  which  faced  the  high  road.  He 
pulled  up  his  fifty  guinea  chestnut  mare  and  took 
a  good  look  at  it.  "Verrinder  Smith,  M.  D.," 
was  printed  across  it  in  very  neat,  small  lettering. 
The  last  man  had  had  letters  half  a  foot  long, 
with  a  lamp  like  a  fire-station.  Dr.  James  Ripley 
noted  the  difference,  and  deduced  from  it  that  the 


THE   DOCTORS  OF   IIOYLAND.  279 

new-comer  miglit  possibly  prove  a  more  formida- 
ble opponent.  He  was  convinced  of  it  that  even- 
ing when  he  came  to  consult  the  current  medical 
directory.  By  it  he  learned  that  Dr.  Verrinder 
Smith  was  the  holder  of  superb  degrees,  that  he 
had  studied  with  distinction  at  Edinburgh,  Paris, 
Berlin,  and  Vienna,  and  finally  that  he  had  been 
awarded  a  gold  medal  and  the  Lee  Hopkins  schol- 
arship for  original  research,  in  recognition  of  an 
exhaustive  inquiry  into  the  functions  of  the  an- 
terior spinal  nerve  roots.  Dr.  Ripley  passed  his 
fingers  through  his  thin  hair  in  bewilderment  as 
he  read  his  rival's  record.  What  on  earth  could 
so  brilliant  a  man  mean  by  putting  up  his  plate  in 
a  little  Hampshire  hamlet. 

But  Dr.  Ripley  furnished  himself  with  an  ex- 
planation to  the  riddle.  No  doubt  Dr.  Verrinder 
Smith  had  simply  come  down  there  in  order  to 
pursue  some  scientific  research  in  peace  and  quiet. 
The  plate  was  up  as  an  address  rather  than  as  an 
invitation  to  patients.  Of  course,  that  must  be 
the  true  explanation.  In  that  case  the  presence 
of  this  brilliant  neighbour  would  be  a  splendid 
thing  for  his  own  studies.  He  had  often  longed 
for  some  kindred  mind,  some  steel  on  which  he 
might  strike  his  flint.  Chance  had  brought  it  to 
him,  and  he  rejoiced  exceedinglj'. 

And  this  joy  it  was  which  led  him  to  take  a 
step  which  was  quite  at  variance  with  his  usual 


280  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

habits.  It  is  the  custom  for  a  new-comer  among 
medical  men  to  call  first  upon  the  older,  and  the 
etiquette  upon  the  subject  is  strict.  Dr.  Ripley 
was  pedantically  exact  on  such  points,  and  yet 
he  deliberately  drove  over  next  day  and  called 
upon  Dr.  Verrinder  Smith.  Such  a  waiving  of 
ceremony  was,  he  felt,  a  gracious  act  upon  his 
part,  and  a  fit  prelude  to  the  intimate  relations 
which  he  hoped  to  establish  with  his  neighbour. 

The  house  was  neat  and  well  appointed,  and 
Dr.  Ripley  was  shown  by  a  smart  maid  into  a 
dapper  little  consulting  room.  As  he  passed  in 
he  noticed  two  or  three  parasols  and  a  lady's  sun 
bonnet  hanging  in  the  hall.  It  was  a  pity  that 
his  colleague  should  be  a  married  man.  It  would 
put  them  ujDon  a  different  footing,  and  interfere 
with  those  long  evenings  of  high  scientific  talk 
which  he  had  pictured  to  himself.  On  the  other 
hand,  there  was  much  in  the  consulting  room  to 
please  him.  Elaborate  instruments,  seen  more 
often  in  hospitals  than  in  the  houses  of  private 
practitioners,  were  scattered  about.  A  sphygmo- 
graph  stood  upon  the  table  and  a  gasometer-like 
engine,  which  was  new  to  Dr.  Ripley,  in  the 
corner.  A  book-case  full  of  ponderous  volumes 
in  French  and  G-erman,  paper-covered  for  the 
most  part,  and  varying  in  tint  from  the  shell  to 
the  yoke  of  a  duck's  egg^  caught  his  wandering 
eyes,  and  he  was  deeply  absorbed  in  their  titles 


THE   DOCTORS  OF   IIOYLANI).  281 

when  the  door  opened  suddenly  behind  him. 
Turning  round,  he  found  himself  facing  a  little 
woman,  whose  plain,  palish  face  was  remarkable 
only  for  a  pair  of  shrewd,  humorous  eyes  of  a 
blue  which  had  two  shades  too  much  green  in  it. 
She  held  a  pince-nez  in  her  left  hand,  and  the 
doctor's  card  in  her  right. 

"  How  do  you  do,  Dr.  Ripley  ?  "  said  she. 

"How  do  you  do,  madam?"  returned  the 
visitor.     "  Your  husband  is  perhaps  out  ? " 

"I  am  not  married,"  said  she  simply. 

"  Oh,  I  beg  your  pardon  !  I  meant  the  doctor 
— Dr.  Yerrinder  Smith." 

"I  am  Dr.  Yerrinder  Smith." 

Dr.  Ripley  was  so  surprised  that  he  dropped 
his  hat  and  forgot  to  pick  it  up  again. 

"What!"  he  grasped,  "the  Lee  Hopkins 
prizeman  !     You  !  " 

He  had  never  seen  a  woman  doctor  before,  and 
his  whole  conservative  soul  rose  up  in  revolt  at 
the  idea.  He  could  not  recall  any  Biblical  injunc- 
tion that  the  man  should  remain  ever  the  doctor 
and  the  woman  the  nurse,  and  yet  he  felt  as  if 
a  blasphemy  had  been  committed.  His  face 
betrayed  his  feelings  only  too  clearly. 

"I  am  sorry  to  disappoint  you,"  said  the  lady 
drily. 

"You  certainly  have  surprised  me,"  he  an- 
swered, picking  up  his  hat. 

19 


282  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

~ "  You  are  not  among  our  champions,  then  ? " 

"I  cannot  say  that  the  movement  has  my 
approval." 

"And  why?" 

"  I  should  much  prefer  not  to  discuss  it." 

"But  I  am  sure  you  will  answer  a  lady's 
question." 

"Ladies  are  in  danger  of  losing  their  privileges 
when  they  usurp  the  place  of  the  other  sex.  They 
cannot  claim  both." 

"  Why  should  a  woman  not  earn  her  bread  by 
her  brains  'i ' ' 

Dr.  Ripley  felt  irritated  by  the  quiet  manner 
in  which  the  lady  cross-questioned  him. 

"I  sliould  much  prefer  not  to  be  led  into  a 
discussion,  Miss  Smith." 

"Dr.  Smith,"  she  interrupted. 

"  Well,  Dr.  Smith  !  But  if  you  insist  upon  an 
answer,  I  must  say  that  I  do  not  think  medicine  a 
suitable  profession  for  women  and  that  I  have  a 
personal  objection  to  masculine  ladies." 

It  was  an  excedingly  rude  speech,  and  he  was 
ashamed  of  it  the  instant  after  he  had  made  it. 
The  lady,  however,  simply  raised  her  eyebrows 
and  smiled. 

"It  seems  to  me  that  you  are  begging  the 
question,"  said  she.  "Of  course,  if  it  makes 
women  masculine  that  would  be  a  considerable 
deterioration. " 


THE   DOCTORS  OF   llOYLAND.  283 

It  was  a  neat  little  counter,  and  Dr.  Ripley, 
like  a  pinked  fencer,  bowed  his  acknowledgment. 

"I  must  go,"  said  he. 

"I  am  sorry  that  we  cannot  come  to  some 
more  friendly  conclusion  since  we  are  to  be 
neighbours,"  she  remarked. 

He  bowed  again,  and  took  a  step  towards  the 
door. 

"It  was  a  singular  coincidence,"  she  continued, 
"  that  at  the  instant  that  you  called  I  was  reading 
your  paper  on  'Locomotor  Ataxia,'  in  the 
Lancet.'''' 

"Indeed,"  said  he  drily. 

"I  thought  it  was  a  very  able  monograph." 

"You  are  very  good." 

"But  the  views  which  you  attribute  to  Pro- 
fessor Pitres,  of  Bordeaux,  have  been  repudiated 
by  him." 

"  I  have  his  pamphlet  of  1890,"  said  Dr.  Ripley 
angrily. 

"Here  is  his  pamphlet  of  1891."  She  picked  it 
from  among  a  litter  of  periodicals.  "  If  you  have 
time  to  glance  your  eye  down  this  passage " 

Dr.  Ripley  took  it  from  her  and  shot  rapidly 
through  the  paragraph  which  she  indicated. 
There  was  no  denying  that  it  completely  knocked 
the  bottom  out  of  his  own  article.  He  threw  it 
down,  and  with  another  frigid  bow  he  made  for 
the  door.     As  he  took  the  reins  from  the  groom 


281  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

he  glanced  round  and  saw  that  the  lady  was 
standing  at  her  window,  and  it  seemed  to  him 
that  she  was  laughing  heartily. 

All  day  the  memory  of  this  interview  haunted 
him.  He  felt  that  he  had  come  very  badly  out  of 
it.  She  had  showed  herself  to  be  his  superior  on 
his  own  pet  subject.  She  had  been  courteous 
while  he  had  been  rude,  self  possessed  when  he 
had  been  angry.  And  then,  above  all,  there  was 
her  presence,  her  monstrous  intrusion  to  rankle  in 
his  mind.  A  woman  doctor  had  been  an  abstract 
thing  before,  repugnant  but  distant.  Now  she 
was  there  in  actual  practice,  with  a  brass  plate  up 
just  like  his  own,  competing  for  the  same  patients. 
Not  that  he  feared  competition,  but  he  objected  to 
this  lowering  of  his  ideal  of  womanhood.  She 
could  not  be  more  than  thirty,  and  had  a  bright, 
mobile  face,  too.  He  thought  of  her  humorous 
eyes,  and  of  her  strong,  well-turned  chin.  It  re- 
volted him  the  more  to  recall  the  details  of  her 
education.  A  man,  of  course,  could  come  through 
such  an  ordeal  with  all  his  purity,  but  it  was  noth- 
ing short  of  shameless  in  a  woman. 

But  it  was  not  long  before  he  learned  that  even 
her  competition  was  a  thing  to  be  feared.  The 
novelty  of  her  presence  had  brought  a  few  curious 
invalids  into  her  consulting  rooms,  and,  once  there, 
they  had  been  so  impressed  by  the  firmness  of  her 
manner  and  by  the  singular,  new-fashioned  instru- 


THE   DOCTORS  OF   IIOYLAND.  285 

ments  with  which  she  tapped,  and  peered,  and 
sounded,  that  it  formed  the  core  of  their  conversa- 
tion for  weeks  afterwards.  And  soon  there  were 
tangible  proofs  of  her  powers  upon  the  country 
side.  Farmer  Eyton,  whose  callous  ulcer  had  been 
quietly  spreading  over  his  shin  for  years  back 
under  a  gentle  regime  of  zinc  ointment,  was 
painted  round  with  blistering  fluid,  and  found, 
after  three  blasphemous  nights,  that  his  sore  was 
stimulated  into  healing.  Mrs.  CroAvder,  who  had 
always  regarded  the  birthmark  upon  her  second 
daughter  Eliza  as  a  sign  of  the  indignation  of  the 
Creator  at  a  third  helping  of  raspberry  tart  which 
she  had  partaken  of  during  a  critical  period, 
learned  that,  with  the  help  of  two  galvanic 
needles,  the  mischief  w^as  not  irreparable.  In  a 
month  Dr.  Yerrinder  Smith  w^as  known,  and  in 
two  she  was  famous. 

Occasionally,  Dr.  Ripley  met  her  as  he  drove 
upon  his  rounds.  She  had  started  a  high  dog- 
cart, taking  the  reins  herself,  with  a  little  tiger 
behind.  When  they  met  he  invariabl}^  raised  his 
hat  with  punctilious  politeness,  but  the  grim  se- 
verity of  his  face  showed  how  formal  was  the 
courtesy.  In  fact,  his  dislike  was  rapidly  deep- 
ening into  absolute  detestation.  "The  unsexed 
w^oman,"  was  the  description  of  her  which  he  per- 
mitted himself  to  give  to  those  of  his  patients  who 
still  remained  staunch.     But,  indeed,  they  were  a 


286  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

rapidly -decreasing  body,  and  every  day  liis.  pride 
was  galled  by  the  news  of  some  fresh  defection. 
The  lady  had  somehow  impressed  the  country  folk 
with  almost  superstitions  belief  in  her  power,  and 
from  far  and  near  they  flocked  to  her  consulting 
room. 

But  what  galled  him  most  of  all  was,  when  she 
did  something  which  he  had  pronounced  to  be  im- 
practicable. For  all  his  knowledge  he  lacked  nerve 
as  an  operator,  and  usually  sent  his  worst  cases  up 
to  London.  The  lady,  however,  had  no  weakness 
of  the  sort,  and  took  everything  that  came  in  her 
way.  It  was  agony  to  him  to  hear  that  she  was 
about  to  straighten  little  Alec  Turner's  club  foot, 
and  right  at  the  fringe  of  the  rumour  came  a  note 
from  his  mother,  the  rector's  wife,  asking  him  if 
he  would  be  so  good  as  to  act  as  chloroformist.  It 
would  be  inhumanity  to  refuse,  as  there  was  no 
other  who  could  take  the  place,  but  it  was  gall 
and  wormwood  to  his  sensitive  nature.  Yet,  in 
spite  of  his  vexation,  he  could  not  but  admire  the 
dexterity  with  which  the  thing  was  dooe.  She 
handled  the  little  wax-like  foot  so  gently,  and 
held  the  tiny  tenotomy  knife  as  an  artist  holds 
his  pencil.  One  straight  insertion,  one  snick  of  a 
tendon,  and  it  was  all  over  without  a  stain  upon 
the  white  towel  which  lay  beneath.  He  had  never 
seen  anything  more  masterly,  and  he  had  the  hon- 
esty to  say  so,  though  her  skill  increased  his  dis- 


THE   DOCTORS  OF   HOYLAND. 


287 


like  of  her.  The  operation  spread  her  fame  still 
further  at  his  expense,  and  self-preservation  was 
added  to  his  other  grounds  for  detesting  her.  And 
this  very  detestation  it  was  which  brought  matters 
to  a  curious  climax. 

One  winter's  night,  just  as  he  was  rising  from 
his  lonely  dinner,  a  groom  came  riding  down  from 
Squire  Faircastle's,  the  richest  man  in  the  district, 
to  say  that  his  daughter  had  scalded  her  hand, 
and  that  medical  help  was  needed  on  the  instant. 
The  coachman  had  ridden  for  the  lady  doctor,  for 
it  mattered  nothing  to  the  Squire  who  came  as 
long  as  it  were  speedily.  Dr.  Eipley  rushed  from 
his  surgery  with  the  determination  that  she  should 
not  effect  an  entrance  into  this  stronghold  of  his  if 
hard  driving  on  his  part  could  prevent  it.  He  did 
not  even  wait  to  light  his  lamps,  but  sprang  into 
his  gig  and  flew  off  as  fast  as  hoof  could  rattle. 
He  lived  rather  nearer  to  the  Squire's  than  she 
did,  and  was  convinced  that  he  could  get  there 
well  before  her. 

And  so  he  would  but  for  that  w^himsical  ele- 
ment of  chance,  which  will  for  ever  muddle  up 
the  affaii's  of  this  world  and  dumbfound  the 
prophets.  Whether  it  came  from  the  want  of  his 
lights,  or  from  his  mind  being  full  of  the  thoughts 
of  his  rival,  he  allowed  too  little  by  half  a  foot  in 
taking  the  sharp  turn  upon  the  Basingstoke  road. 
The  empty  trap  and  the  frightened  horse  clattered 


288  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

away  into  the  darkness,  while  the  Squire's  groom 
crawled  out  of  the  ditch  into  which  he  had  been 
shot.  He  struck  a  match,  looked  down  at  his 
groaning  companion,  and  then,  after  the  fashion 
of  rough,  strong  men  when  they  see  what  they 
have  not  seen  before,  he  was  very  sick. 

The  doctor  raised  himself  a  little  on  his  elbow 
in  the  glint  of  the  match.  He  caught  a  glimpse 
of  something  white  and  sharp  bristling  through 
his  trouser  leg  half  way  down  the  shin. 

"Compound!"  he  groaned.  "  A  three  months' 
job,"  and  fainted. 

When  he  came  to  himself  the  groom  was  gone, 
for  he  had  scudded  off  to  the  Squire's  house  for 
help,  but  a  small  page  was  holding  a  gig- lamp  in 
front  of  his  injured  leg,  and  a  woman,  with  an 
open  case  of  polished  instruments  gleaming  in  the 
yellow  light,  w^as  deftly  slitting  up  his  trouser 
with  a  crooked  pair  of  scissors. 

"It's  all  right,  doctor,"  said  she  soothingly. 
"I  am  so  sorry  about  it.  You  can  have  Dr. 
Horton  to-morrow,  but  I  am  sure  you  will  allow 
me  to  help  you  to-night.  I  could  hardly  believe 
my  eyes  when  I  saw  you  by  the  roadside." 

"The  groom  has  gone  for  help, "  groaned  the 
sufferer. 

"When  it  comes  we  can  move  you  into  the 
gig.  A  little  more  light,  John !  So !  Ah,  dear, 
dear,  we  shall  have  laceration  unless  we  reduce 


^. 


THE   DOCTORS  OF   IIOYLAXD.  9S9 

this  before  we  move  you.  Allow  me  to  give  you 
a  whiff  of  chloroform,  and  I  have  no  doubt  that 
I  can  secure  it  sufficiently  to " 

Dr.  Ripley  never  heard  the  end  of  that  sen- 
tence. He  tried  to  raise  a  hand  and  to  murmur 
something  in  protest,  but  a  sweet  smell  was  in  his 
nostrils,  and  a  sense  of  rich  peace  and  lethargy 
stole  over  his  jangled  nerves.  Down  he  sank, 
through  clear,  cool  water,  ever  down  and  down 
into  the  green  shadows  beneath,  gently,  without 
effort,  while  the  pleasant  chiming  of  a  great  belfry 
rose  and  fell  in  his  ears.  Then  he  rose  again,  up 
and  lip,  and  ever  up,  with  a  terrible  tightness 
about  his  temples,  until  at  last  he  shot  out  of 
those  green  shadows  and  was  in  the  light  once 
more.  Two  bright,  shining,  golden  spots  gleamed 
before  his  dazed  eyes.  He  blinked  and  blinked 
before  he  could  give  a  name  to  them.  They  were 
only  the  two  brass  balls  at  the  end  posts  of  his 
bed,  and  he  was  lying  in  his  own  little  room,  with 
a  head,  like  a  cannon  ball,  and  a  leg  like  an  iron 
bar.  Turning  his  eyes,  he  saw  the  calm  face  of 
Dr.  Yerrinder  Smith  looking  down  at  him. 

"Ah,  at  last !  "  said  she.  "  I  kept  you  under 
all  the  way  home,  for  I  knew  how  painful  the  jolt- 
ing would  be.  It  is  in  good  position  now  with  a 
strong  side  splint.  I  have  ordered  a  morphia 
draught  for  you.  Shall  I  tell  your  groom  to  ride 
for  Dr.  Horton  in  the  morning  ? " 


290  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

"  I  should  prefer  that  you  should  continue  the 
case,"  said  Dr.  Ripley  feebly,  and  then,  with 
a  half  hysterical  laugh, — "You  have  all  the  rest 
of  the  parish  as  patients,  you  know,  so  you  may 
as  well  make  the  thing  complete  by  having  me 
also." 

It  was  not  a  very  gracious  speech,  but  it 
was  a  look  of  pity  and  not  of  anger  which 
shone  in  her  eyes  as  she  turned  away  from  his 
bedside. 

Dr.  Ripley  had  a  brother,  William,  who 
was  assistant  surgeon  at  a  London  hospital,  and 
who  was  down  in  Hampshire  within  a  few  hours 
of  his  hearing  of  the  accident.  He  raised  his 
brows  when  he  heard  the  details. 

"  What !  You  are  pestered  with  one  of  those  ! " 
he  cried. 

"  I  don't  know  what  I  should  have  done  with- 
out her." 

"  I've  no  doubt  she's  an  excellent  nurse." 

"  She  knows  her  work  as  well  as  you  or  I." 

"Speak  for  yourself,  James,"  said  the  Lon- 
don man  with  a  sniff.  "But  apart  from  that, 
you  know  that  the  principle  of  the  thing  is  all 
wrong." 

"You  think  there  is  nothing  to  be  said  on  the 
other  side  ? " 

"  Good  heavens  !  do  you  ?  " 

"Well,  I  don't  know.     It  struck  me  during 


THE   DOCTORS  OP   HOYLAXD.  291 

the  night  that  we  may  have  been  a  little  narrow 
in  our  views." 

"Nonsense,  James.  It's  all  very  fine  for 
women  to  win  prizes  in  the  lecture  room,  but 
you  know  as  well  as  I  do  that  they  are  no  use  in 
an  emergency.  Now  I  warrant  that  this  woman 
was  all  nerves  when  she  was  setting  your  leg. 
That  reminds  me  that  I  had  better  just  take  a 
look  at  it  and  see  that  it  is  all  right." 

"I  would  rather  that  you  did  not  undo  it," 
said  the  patient.  "I  have  her  assurance  that  it 
is  all  right. " 

Brother  William  was  deeply  shocked. 

"Of  course,  if  a  woman's  assurance  is  of  more 
value  than  the  opinion  of  the  assistant  surgeon  of 
a  London  hospital,  there  is  nothing  more  to  be 
said,"  he  remarked. 

"  I  should  prefer  that  you  did  not  touch  it," 
said  the  patient  firmly,  and  Dr.  William  went 
back  to  London  that  evening  in  a  huff. 

The  lady,  who  had  heard  of  his  coming,  was 
much  surprised  on  learning  his  departure. 

"  We  had  a  difference  upon  a  point  of  profes- 
sional etiquette,"  said  Dr.  James,  and  it  was  all 
the  explanation  he  would  vouchsafe. 

For  two  long  months  Dr.  RIi")ley  was  brought 
in  contact  with  his  rival  every  day,  and  he 
learned  many  things  which  he  had  not  known 
before.     She  was  a  charming  companion,  as  well 


202  ROUND  THE   RED   LAMP. 

as  a  most  assiduous  doctor.  Her  short  presence 
during  the  long,  weary  day  was  like  a  flower  in 
a  sand  waste.  What  interested  him  w^as  precisely 
what  interested  her,  and  she  could  meet  him  at 
every  point  upon  equal  terms.  And  yet  under  all 
her  learning  and  her  firmness  ran  a  sweet,  woman- 
ly nature,  peeping  out  in  her  talk,  shining  in  her 
greenish  eyes,  showing  itself  in  a  thousand  subtle 
ways  which  the  dullest  of  men  could  read.  And 
he,  though  a  bit  of  a  prig  and  a  pedant,  was  by 
no  means  dull,  and  had  honesty  enough  to  con- 
fess when  he  was  in  the  wrong. 

"I  don't  know  how  to  apologise  to  you,"  he 
said  in  his  shame-faced  fashion  one  day,  when  he 
had  progressed  so  far  as  to  be  able  to  sit  in  an 
arm-chair  with  his  leg  upon  another  one  ;  "I  feel 
that  I  have  been  quite  in  the  wrong." 

"Why,  then?" 

"  Over  this  woman  question.  I  used  to  think 
that  a  woman  must  inevitably  lose  something  of 
her  charm  if  she  took  up  such  studies." 

"Oh,  you  don't  think  they  are  necessarily 
unsexed,  then  ? "  she  cried,  with  a  mischievous 
smile. 

"  Please  don't  recall  my  idiotic  expression." 

"I  feel  so  pleased  that  I  should  have  helped 
in  changing  your  views.  I  think  that  it  is  the 
most  sincere  compliment  that  I  have  ever  had 
paid  me." 


THE    DOCTORS   OF   IIOVLAND.  093 

"At  any  rate,  it  is  the  truth,"  said  he,  and  was 
happy  all  night  at  the  remembrance  of  the  flush 
of  pleasure  which  made  her  pale  face  look  quite 
comely  for  the  instant. 

For,  indeed,  he  was  already  far  past  the  stage 
when  he  would  acknowledge  her  as  the  equal  of 
any  other  woman.  Already  he  could  not  disguise 
from  himself  that  she  had  become  the  one  woman. 
Her  dainty  skill,  her  gentle  touch,  her  sweet  pres- 
ence, the  community  of  their  tastes,  had  all  united 
to  hopelessly  upset  his  previous  opinions.  It  was 
a  dark  day  for  him  now  when  his  convalescence 
allowed  her  to  miss  a  visit,  and  darker  still  that 
other  one  which  he  saw  approaching  w^hen  all  oc- 
casion for  her  visits  would  be  at  an  end.  It  came 
round  at  last,  however,  and  he  felt  that  his  whole 
life's  fortune  would  hang  upon  the  issue  of  that 
final  interview.  He  was  a  direct  man  by  na- 
ture, so  he  laid  his  hand  upon  hers  as  it  felt 
for  his  pulse,  and  he  asked  her  if  she  would  be 
his  wife. 

"  What,  and  unite  the  practices  ?  "  said  she. 

He  started  in  pain  and  anger. 

"Surely  you  do  not  attribute  any  such  base 
motive  to  me  !  "  he  cried.  "Hove  you  as  unsel- 
fishly as  ever  a  w^oman  was  loved." 

"No,  I  was  wTong.  It  was  a  foolish  speech," 
said  she,  moving  her  chair  a  little  back,  and  tap- 
ping her  stethoscope  upon  her  knee.      "Forget 


294  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

that  I  ever  said  it,  I  am  so  sorry  to  cause  "you 
any  disappointment,  and  I  aj^preciate  most  highly 
the  honour  which  you  do  me,  but  what  you  ask  is 
quite  impossible." 

With  another  woman  he  might  have  urged  the 
point,  but  his  instincts  told  him  that  it  was  quite 
useless  with  this  one.  Her  tone  of  voice  was  con- 
clusive. He  said  nothing,  but  leaned  back  in  his 
chair  a  stricken  man. 

"I  am  so  sorry,"  she  said  again.  "If  I  had 
known  what  was  passing  in  your  mind  I  should 
have  told  you  earlier  that  I  intended  to  devote  my 
life  entirely  to  science.  There  are  many  women 
with  a  capacity  for  marriage,  but  few  with  a  taste 
for  biology.  I  will  remain  true  to  my  own  line, 
then.  I  came  down  here  while  waiting  for  an 
opening  in  the  Paris  Physiological  Laboratory.  I 
have  just  heard  that  there  is  a  vacancy  for  me 
there,  and  so  you  will  be  troubled  no  more  by 
my  intrusion  upon  your  practice.  ^  I  have  done 
you  an  injustice  just  as  you  did  me  one.  I 
thought  you  narrow  and  pedantic,  with  no  good 
quality.  I  have  learned  during  your  illness  to 
appreciate  you  better,  and  the  recollection  of  our 
friendship  will  always  be  a  very  pleasant  one 
to  me." 

And  so  it  came  about  that  in  a  very  few  weeks 
there  was  only  one  doctor  in  Hoyland.  But  folks 
noticed  that  the  one  had  aged  many  years  in  a  few 


THE  DOCTORS  OF  HOYLAND.        295 

months,  that  a  weary  sadness  lurked  always  in 
the  depths  of  his  blue  eyes,  and  that  he  was  less 
concerned  than  ever  with  the  eligible  young  ladies 
whom  chance,  or  their  careful  country  mammas, 
placed  in  his  way. 


THE  SURGEON  TALKS. 

"  Men  die  of  the  diseases  which  they  have 
studied  most,"  remarked  the  surgeon,  snipping  off 
the  end  of  a  cigar  with  all  his  professional  neat- 
ness and  finish.  "  It's  as  if  the  morbid  condition 
was  an  evil  creature  which,  when  it  found  itself 
closely  hunted,  flew  at  the  throat  of  its  pursuer. 
If  you  worry  the  microbes  too  much  they  may 
worry  you.  I've  seen  cases  of  it,  and  not  neces- 
sarily in  microbic  diselffees  either.  There  was,  of 
course,  the  well-known  instance  of  Liston  and  the 
aneurism ;  and  a  dozen  others  that  I  could  men- 
tion. You  couldn't  have  a  clearer  case  than  that 
of  poor  old  Walker  of  St.  Christopher's.  Not 
heard  of  it  ?  WeU,  of  course,  it  was  a  little  be- 
fore your  time,  but  I  wonder  that  it  should  have 
been  forgotten.  You  youngsters  are  so  busy  in 
keeping  up  to  the  day  that  you  lose  a  good  deal 
that  is  interesting  of  yesterday. 

"Walker  was  one  of  the  best  men  in  Europe 
on  nervous  disease.  You  must  have  read  his 
little  book  on  sclerosis  of  the  posterior  columns. 

(296) 


THE  SURGEON  TALKS.  297 

It's  as  interesting  as  a  novel,  and  epoch-makivii; 
in  its  way.  He  worked  like  a  horse,  did  Walker 
— huge  consulting  practice— hours  a  daj^  in  the 
clinical  wards— constant  original  investigations. 
And  then  he  enjoyed  himself  also.  '  De  mor- 
tuis^''  of  course,  but  still  it's  an  open  secret  among 
all  who  knew  him.  If  he  died  at  forty-five,  he 
crammed  eighty  years  into  it.  The  marvel  was 
that  he  could  have  held  on  so  long  at  the  pace 
at  which  he  was  going.  But  he  took  it  beauti- 
fully when  it  came. 

"I  was  his  clinical  assistant  at  the  time. 
Walker  was  lecturing  on  locomotor  ataxia  to  a 
wardful  of  youngsters.  He  was  explaining  that 
one  of  the  early  signs  of  the  complaint  was  that 
the  patient  could  not  put  his  heels  together  with 
his  eyes  shut  without  staggering.  As  he  spoke, 
he  suited  the  action  to  the  word.  I  don't  sup- 
pose the  boys  noticed  anything.  I  did,  and  so 
did  he,  though  he  finished  his  lecture  without  a 
sign. 

"  When  it  was  over  he  came  into  my  room  and 
lit  a  cigarette. 

"  '  Just  run  over  my  reflexes.  Smith,'  said  he. 

"There,  was  hardly  a  trace  of  them  left.  I 
tapped  away  at  his  knee-tendon  and  might  as 
well  have  tried  to  get  a  jerk  out  of  that  sofa-cush- 
ion. He  stood  with  his  eyes  shut  again,  and  he 
swayed  like  a  bush  in  the  wind. 

20 


298  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

"  'So,'  said  he,  'it  was  not  intercostal  neural- 
gia after  all.' 

"  Then  I  knew  that  he  had  had  the  lightning 
pains,  and  that  the  case  was  complete.  There 
was  nothing  to  say,  so  I  sat  looking  at  him  while 
he  puffed  and  puffed  at  his  cigarette.  Here  he 
was,  a  man  in  the  prime  of  life,  one  of  the  hand- 
somest men  in  London,  with  money,  fame,  social 
success,  everything  at  his  feet,  and  now,  without 
a  moment's  warning,  he  was  told  that  inevitable 
death  lay  before  him,  a  death  accompanied  by 
more  refined  and  lingering  tortures  than  if  he 
were  bound  upon  a  Red  Indian  stake.  He  sat 
in  the  middle  of  the  blue  cigarette  cloud  with  his 
eyes  cast  down,  and  the  slightest  little  tightening 
of  his  lips.  Then  he  rose  with  a  motion  of  his 
arms,  as  one  who  throws  off  old  thoughts  and  en- 
ters upon  a  new  course. 

'"Better  put  this  thing  straight  at  once, 
said  he.  '  I  must  make  some  fresh  arrange- 
ments.    May  I  use  your  paper  and  envelopes  ? ' 

"  He  settled  himself  at  my  desk  and  he  wrote 
half  a  dozen  letters.  It  is  not  a  breach  of  con- 
fidence to  say  that  they  were  not  addressed  to 
his  professional  brothers.  Walker  was  a  single 
man,  which  means  that  he  was  not  restricted  to 
a  single  woman.  When  he  had  finished,  he 
walked  out  of  that  little  room  of  mine,  leaving 
every  hope  and  ambition  of  his  life  behind  him. 


THE  SURGEON  TALKS.  299 

And  lie  might  liave  had  another  year  of  ignorance 
and  peace  if  it  had  not  been  for  the  chance  illus- 
tration in  his  lecture. 

"  It  took  five  years  to  kill  him,  and  he  stood  it 
well.  If  he  had  ever  been  a  little  irregular  he 
atoned  for  it  in  that  long  martyrdom.  He  kept 
an  admirable  record  of  his  own  symptoms,  and 
worked  out  the  eye  changes  more  fully  than  has 
ever  been  done.  When  the  ptosis  got  very  bad 
he  would  hold  his  eyelid  up  with  one  hand  while 
he  wrote.  Then,  when  he  could  not  co-ordinate 
his  muscles  to  write,  he  dictated  to  his  nurse. 
So  died,  in  the  odour  of  science,  James  Walker, 
c-et.  45. 

"Poor  old  Walker  was  very  fond  of  experi- 
mental surgery,  and  he  l)roke  ground  in  several 
directions.  Between  ourselves,  there  may  have 
been  some  more  ground-breaking  afterwards,  but 
he  did  his  best  for  his  cases.  You  know  M'Na- 
mara,  don't  you  ?  He  always  wears  his  hair  long. 
He  lets  it  be  understood  that  it  comes  from  his 
artistic  strain,  but  it  is  really  to  conceal  the  loss 
of  one  of  his  ears.  Walker  cut  the  other  one  off, 
but  you  must  not  tell  Mac  I  said  so. 

"It  was  like  this.  Walker  had  a  fad  about 
the  portio  dura— the  motor  to  the  face,  you  know 
—and  he  thought  paralysis  of  it  came  from  a  dis- 
turbance of  the  blood  supply.  Something  else 
which   counterbalanced  that  disturbance  might, 


300  ROUND  thp:  red  lamp. 

he  thought,  set  it  right  again.  We  had  a.  very 
obstinate  case  of  Bell's  paralysis  in  the  wards, 
and  had  tried  it  with  every  conceivable  thing, 
blistering,  tonics,  nerve-stretching,  galvanism, 
needles,  but  all  without  result.  Walker  got  it 
into  his  head  that  removal  of  the  ear  would  in- 
crease the  blood  supply  to  the  part,  and  he  very 
soon  gained  the  consent  of  the  patient  to  the 
operation.  ^ 

"  Well,  we  did  it  at  night.  Walker,  of  course, 
felt  that  it  was  something  of  an  experiment,  and 
did  not  wish  too  much  talk  about  it  unless  it 
proved  successful.  There  were  half-a-dozen  of  us 
there,  M'Namara  and  I  among  the  rest.  The 
room  was  a  small  one,  and  in  the  centre  was  in 
the  narrow  table,  with  a  macintosh  over  the  pil- 
low, and  a  blanket  which  extended  almost  to  the 
floor  on  either  side.  Two  candles,  on  a  side-table 
near  the  pillow,  supplied  all  the  light.  In  came 
the  patient,  with  one  side  of  his  face  as  smooth  as 
a  baby's,  and  the  other  all  in  a  quiver  with  fright. 
He  lay  down,  and  the  chloroform  towel  was 
placed  over  his  face,  while  Walker  threaded  his 
needles  in  the  candle  light.  The  chloroformist 
stood  at  the  head  of  the  table,  and  M'Namara  was 
stationed  at  the  side  to  control  the  patient.  The 
rest  of  us  stood  by  to  assist. 

"  Well,  the  man  vras  about  half  over  when  he 
fell  into  one  of  those  convulsive  flurries  which 


THE  SURGEON   TALKS.  3OI 

come  witli  the  semi-unconscious  stage.  He  kicked 
and  plunged  and  struck  out  with  both  hands. 
Over  with  a  crash  went  the  little  table  which  held 
the  candles,  and  in  an  instant  we  were  left  in  total 
darkness.  You  can  think  what  a  rush  and  a 
scurry  there  was,  one  to  pick  up  the  table,  one  to 
find  the  matches,  and  some  to  restrain  the  patient 
who  was  still  dashing  himself  about.  He  was 
held  down  by  two  dressers,  the  chloroform  was 
pushed,  and  by  the  time  the  candles  were  re- 
lit, his  incoherent,  half -smothered  shoutings  had 
changed  to  a  stertorous  snore.  His  head  was 
turned  on  the  pillow  and  the  towel  was  still  kept 
over  his  face  while  the  operation  was  earned 
through.  Then  the  towel  was  withdrawn,  and 
you  can  conceive  our  amazement  when  we  looked 
upon  the  face  of  M'Namara. 

"  How  did  it  happen  ?  Why,  simply  enough. 
As  the  candles  went  over,  the  chloroformist  had 
stopped  for  an  instant  and  had  tried  to  catch 
them.  The  patient,  just  as  the  light  went  out, 
had  rolled  off  and  under  the  table.  Poor  M'Na- 
mara,  clinging  frantically  to  him,  had  been  dragged 
across  it,  and  the  chloroformist,  feeling  him  there, 
had  naturally  clapped  the  towel  across  his  mouth 
and  nose.  The  others  had  secured  him,  and  the 
more  he  roared  and  kicked  the  more  they  drenched 
him  with  chloroform.  Walker  was  very  nice 
about  it,  and  made  the  most  handsome  apologies. 


302  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

Ke  offered  to  do  a  plastic  on  the  sijot,  and  make 
as  good  an  ear  as  he  could,  but  M'Namara  had 
had  enough  of  it.  As  to  the  patient,  we  found 
him  sleeping  placidly  under  the  table,  with  the 
ends  of  the  blanket  screening  him  on  both  sides. 
Walker  sent  M'Namara  round  his  ear  next  day  in 
a  jar  of  methylated  spirit,  but  Mac's  wife  was  very 
angry  about  it,  and  it  led  to  a  good  deal  of  ill- 
feeling. 

"  Some  people  say  that  the  more  one  has  to  do 
with  human  nature,  and  the  closer  one  is  brought 
in  contact  with  it,  the  less  one  thinks  of  it.  I 
don't  believe  that  those  who  know  most  would 
uphold  that  view.  My  own  experience  is  dead 
against  it.  I  was  brought  up  in  the  miserable- 
mortal-clay  school  of  theology,  and  yet  here  I 
am,  after  thirty  years  of  intimate  acquaintance 
with  humanity,  filled  with  respect  for  it.  The 
evil  lies  commonly  upon  the  surface.  The  deeper 
strata  are  good.  A  hundred  times  I  have  seen 
folk  condemned  to  death  as  suddenly  as  poor 
Walker  was.  Sometimes  it  was  to  blindness  or 
to  mutilations  which  are  worse  than  death.  Men 
and  women,  they  almost  all  took  it  beautifully, 
and  some  with  such  lovely  unselfishness,  and  with 
such  complete  absorption  in  the  thought  of  how 
their  fate  would  affect  others,  that  the  man  about 
town,  or  the  frivolously- dressed  woman  has  seemed 
to  change  into  an  angel  before  my  eyes.     I  have 


THE  SURGEON  TALKS. 


303 


seen  deatli-beds,  too,  of  all  ages  and  of  all  creeds 
and  want  of  creeds.  I  never  saw  any  of  them 
slirink,  save  only  one  poor,  imaginative  young 
fellow,  who  had  spent  his  blameless  life  in  the 
strictest  of  sects.  Of  course,  an  exhausted  frame 
is  incapable  of  fear,  as  anyone  can  vouch  who  is 
told,  in  the  midst  of  his  sea-sickness,  that  the 
ship  is  going  to  the  bottom.  That  is  why  I  rate 
courage  in  the  face  of  mutilation  to  be  higher  than  \ 
courage  when  a  wasting  illness  is  fining  away  into  ^ 
death. 

"Now,  111  take  a  case  which  I  had  in  my  own 
practice  last  Wednesday.  A  lady  came  in  to 
consult  me — the  wife  of  a  well-known  sporting 
baronet.  The  husband  had  come  with  her,  but 
remained,  at  her  request,  in  the  waiting-room.  I 
need  not  go  into  details,  but  it  proved  to  be  a  pe- 
culiarly malignant  case  of  cancer.  'I  knew  it,' 
said  she.  'How  long  have  I  to  live?'  'I  fear 
that  it  may  exhaust  your  strength  in  a  few 
months,'  I  answered,  '  Poor  old  Jack  ! '  said  she. 
'I'll  tell  him  that  it  is  not  dangerous.'  'Why 
should  you  deceive  him?'  I  asked.  'Well,  he's 
very  uneasy  about  it,  and  he  is  quaking  now  in 
the  waiting-room.  He  has  two  old  friends  to  din- 
ner to-night,  and  I  haven't  the  heart  to  spoil  his 
evening.  To-morrow  will  be  time  enough  for  him 
to  learn  the  truth.'  Out  she  walked,  the  brave 
little  woman,  and  a  moment  later  her  husband, 


304  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

with  his  big,  red  face  shining  with  joy  .came 
plunging  into  my  room  to  shake  me  by  the  hand. 
No,  I  respected  her  wish  and  I  did  not  undeceive 
him.  I  dare  bet  that  evening  was  one  of  the 
brightest,  and  the  next  morning  the  darkest,  of 
his  life. 

"It's  wonderful  how  bravely  and  cheerily  a 
woman  can  face  a  crushing  blow.  It  is  different 
with  men.  A  man  can  stand  it  without  complain- 
ing, but  it  knocks  him  dazed  and  silly  all  the 
same.  But  the  woman  does  not  lose  her  wits  any 
more  than  she  does  her  courage,  j  Now,  I  had  a 
case  only  a  few  weeks  ago  which  would  show  you 
what  I  mean.  A  gentleman  consulted  me  about 
his  wife,  a  very  beautiful  woman.  She  had  a 
small  tubercular  nodule  upon  her  upper  arm,  ac- 
cording to  him.  He  was  sure  that  it  was  of  no 
importance,  but  he  wanted  to  know  whether  Dev- 
onshire or  the  Riviera  would  be  the  better  for  her. 
I  examined  her  and  found  a  frightful  sarcoma  of 
the  bone,  hardly  showing  upon  the  surface,  but 
involving  the  shoulder-blade  and  clavicle  as  well 
as  the  humerus.  A  more  malignant  case  I  have 
never  seen.  I  sent  her  out  of  the  room  and  I 
told  him  the  truth.  What  did  he  do  ?  Why,  he 
walked  slowly  round  that  room  with  his  hands 
behind  his  back,  looking  with  the  greatest  inter- 
est at  the  pictures.  I  can  see  him  now,  putting  up 
his  gold  pince-nez  and  staring  at  them  with  per- 


THE  SUKGEOX   TALKS,  305 

fectly  vacant  eyes,  which  told  me  that  he  saw  nei- 
ther them  nor  the  wall  behind  them.  'Amputa- 
tion of  the  arm  ? '  he  asked  at  last.  '  And  of  the 
collar-bone  and  shoulder-blade,'  said  I.  'Quite 
so.  The  collar-bone  and  shoulder-blade,'  he  re- 
peated, still  staring  about  him  with  those  lifeless 
eyes.  It  settled  him.  I  don't  believe  he'll  ever 
be  the  same  man  again.  But  the  woman  took  it 
as  bravely  and  brightly  as  could  be,  and  she  has 
done  very  well  since.  The  mischief  was  so  great 
that  the  arm  sna]>ped  as  we  drew  it  from  the 
night-dress.  No,  I  don't  think  that  there  will  be 
any  return,  and  I  have  every  hope  of  her  recovery. 
"  The  first  patient  is  a  thing  which  one  remem- 
bers all  one's  life.  Mine  was  commonplace,  and 
the  details  are  of  no  interest.  I  had  a  curious 
visitor,  however,  during  the  first  few  months  after 
my  plate  went  up.  It  was  an  elderly  woman, 
richly  dressed,  with  a  wickerwork  picnic  basket 
in  her  hand.  This  she  opened  with  the  tears 
streaming  down  her  face,  and  out  there  waddled 
the  fattest,  ugliest,  and  mangiest  little  pug  dog 
that  I  have  ever  seen.  '  I  wish  you  to  put  him 
painlessly  out  of  the  world,  doctor,'  she  cried. 
'  Quick,  quick,  or  my  resolution  may  give  way.' 
She  flung  herself  down,  with  hysterical  sobs,  upon 
the  sofa.  The  less  experienced  a  doctor  is,  the 
higher  are  his  notions  of  professional  dignity,  as  I 
need  not  remind  you,  my  young  friend,  so  I  was 


306  ROUND  THE  RED  LAMP. 

about  to  refuse  the  commission  with  indignation, 
when  I  bethought  me  that,  quite  apart  from  medi- 
cine, we  were  gentleman  and  lady,  and  that  she 
had  asked  me  to  do  something  for  her  which  was 
evidently  of  the  greatest  possible  importance  in 
her  eyes.  I  led  off  the  poor  little  doggie,  there- 
fore, and  with  the  help  of  a  saucerful  of  milk  and 
a  few  drops  of  prussic  acid  his  exit  was  as  speedy 
and  painless  as  could  be  desired.  '  Is  it  over  ? ' 
she  cried  as  I  entered.  It  was  really  tragic  to  see 
how  all  the  love  which  should  have  gone  to  hus- 
band and  children  had,  in  default  of  them,  been 
centred  upon  this  uncouth  little  animal.  She  left, 
quite  broken  down,  in  her  carriage,  and  it  was 
only  after  her  departure  that  I  saw  an  envelope 
sealed  with  a  large  red  seal,  and  lying  upon  the 
blotting  pad  of  my  desk.  Outside,  in  pencil,  was 
written :  '  I  have  no  doubt  that  you  would  will- 
ingly have  done  this  without  a  fee,  but  I  insist 
upon  your  acceptance  of  the  enclosed. '  I  opened 
it  with  some  vague  notions  of  an  eccentric  million- 
aire and  a  fifty-pound  note,  but  all  I  found  was  a 
postal  order  for  four  and  sixpence.  The  whole  in- 
cident struck  me  as  so  whimsical  that  I  laughed 
until  I  was  tired.  You'll  find  there's  so  much 
tragedy  in  a  doctor's  life,  my  boy,  that  he  would 
not  be  able  to  stand  it  if  it  were  not  for  the  strain 
of  comedy  which  comes  every  now  and  then  to 
leaven  it. 


THE  SURGEON  TALKS.  307 

"And  a  doctor  has  very  much  to  be  thankful 
for  also.  Don't  you  ever  forget  it.  It  is  such  a 
pleasure  to  do  a  little  good  that  a  man  should  pay 
for  the  privilege  instead  of  being  paid  for  it.  Still, 
of  course,  he  has  his  home  to  keep  up  and  his  wife 
and  children  to  support.  But  his  patients  are  his 
friends— or  they  should  be  so.  He  goes  from 
house  to  house,  and  his  step  and  his  voice  are 
loved  and  welcomed  in  each.  What  could  a  man 
ask  for  more  than  that  1  And  besides,  he  is  forced 
to  be  a  good  man.  It  is  impossible  for  him  to  be 
anything  else.  How  can  a  man  spend  his  whole 
life'  in  seeing  suffering  bravely  borne  and  yet  re- 
main a  hard  or  a  vicious  man  ?  It  is  a  noble,  gen- 
erous, kindly  profession,  and  you  youngsters  have 
got  to  see  that  it  remains  so." 


(16) 


THE  END. 


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